


The Taming of Thorns

by Tipsy_Raccoon



Category: Pilgrimage (2017)
Genre: Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/M, Medieval Ireland, Mysticism, NSFW, Rape/Non-con Elements, Strong Female Characters, explicit for later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-18
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-03-06 11:30:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 32,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13410333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tipsy_Raccoon/pseuds/Tipsy_Raccoon
Summary: Maeve's life was a simple and peaceful one, until the soldiers came. Raymond de Merville notices her, to her detriment. She wants nothing from him but for him to leave, whereas he wants everything she has to offer and more. Their story begins and develops in darkness and hurt - whether it ends as such is up to them. Where prides clash, hearts are broken and wounds inflicted.





	1. What's in a name?

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and thank you for being here! :) 
> 
> This is more of an introductory chapter to set the scene, the pace will pick up throughout later chapters. Regarding these later chapters, a warning at this point: It will become more explicit, and darker (we are in the Middle Ages, after all). There will be non-con elements and such; more detailed warnings will follow at the beginning of those chapters. Religious themes may be thematised in this work in ways that may be offensive to some, but disrespect is never intended.
> 
> While I try to be historically accurate, this is a work of fiction and as such I will take liberties here. This includes some vaguely mystical/fantastical elements that might come in later. 
> 
> The point of view will switch in some chapters to third person, so it will not all be from Maeve's perspective. 
> 
> So much from me at this point - Feedback is welcome! Please keep it constructive and civil. :)

The day the foreigners came is still burnt into my mind. With good reason: It had left marks on my soul and body. 

The king’s men, they called themselves, but their king was not ours. I doubt it would have made them any kinder, even if John _had_ been our king. There were several dozens of them; I never cared to count. I knew superior numbers when I saw them, and they had weapons, horses, skill. Now they were here, all but invading my home.

“You could fight,” their leader called out, “but I would not recommend it. And why would you, being good Christian folk?”  

He clearly wasn’t, despite his holy mission. That man radiated cruelty. He enjoyed killing, revelled in pain and in the power he wielded in bestowing it. My body was tense, waiting for the axe to fall. Why were they here, what did they want from us?

“Who is in charge of this town?”

Nobody answered. It seemed like volunteering to be humiliated at best, maimed at the worst. The invader sighed and nodded at one of his men, who upon the command grabbed the nearest villager. The girl cried out, and my heart stopped.

“Tell whoever _is_ the head of this town that I am willing to strike a deal with him, but I am equally prepared to simply take whatever we need. So what is it to be?”

Another ghostly silence ensued, broken with another cry when the soldier started to drag Ella towards their army. The monks accompanying them looked on helplessly. One of many reasons I could not take God too seriously. When he was needed, he always conveniently looked elsewhere. “Very well. We’ll start with her.”    

“No!” I stepped forward. I didn’t care what he might do to me. He wouldn’t get my sister, not her.

“Maeve, no,” Bea urged and tried to take my wrist to hold me back. Of course she would; she probably thought one of her nieces was already lost and there was no point in risking another. But those murderous invaders would never get my sister, not her.

Their leader looked up, the cruel smirk on his scarred face fading as he turned ice-cold eyes on me. Under any other circumstances, I would have flinched and retreated; but this was my sister. Sweet Ella. So I stood my ground. The whole village had gone quiet around us.

The silence was broken when he got off his horse, chainmail rattling, the mud underneath his boots splattering as he neared me. He was tall. Broad. I was just a girl next to him; despite my nineteen winters and my tall, muscular built that had only developed curves a few years ago. “What do you care for the life of one village girl?” he asked mockingly. His accent was decidedly French, reminding me vaguely of my late stepmother. Despite this familiarity, his words sent shivers down my spine.

He clearly expected no answer, but he got one anyway. I was already marked; marked for being noticed by him. I had nothing to gain by remaining silent.

“She is just a _girl_ ,” I growled. “Whatever you and your men are after, at least take women for it who can fend for themselves.” I swallowed hard, realising I may just have condemned friends and neighbours to a horrid fate. Not everyone had been granted the privilege of a liberal father who taught them the basics of self-defence. “She is just a girl,” I repeated numbly.

The man growled, his blue eyes blazing. Even without the scar he would have been terrifying. “So she is… _you_ , however, are clearly not.” The eyes wandered to my cleavage. A part of me expected him to reach out and take what was on display; he did not.

“She’s too old to be your daughter,” he mused instead, looking back at Ella. “So perhaps your sister?”

I should deny, but it was far too late for that. “Please. Let her go.” My jaw was roughly grabbed, and I was forced to look into those soulless eyes. When he spoke, his voice was eerily calm. Soothing, almost, if the words had not been cruel. He never turned his gaze away from me. “You seem to be used to having influence and power, girl. Perhaps you are the headman’s daughter? Tell him this: My men will need accommodation, our horses fed. We need to pass Buaic Dubh, when the weather has cleared. Until then, we will stay.”

No, no, no. I wriggled ever so slightly to get away from him, to break his hold on me. A mistake, as it turned out. The general turned to his men and grunted in French: “Let the girl go.” Turning back to me, he said with a leer, still in his native tongue: “I will take this one instead.”

For the moment, I pretended to not understand a word. Ignorance could be salvation.

Ella gasped and let out a cry when the brute holding her released her. “Your insolence, sweetling, won’t be forgotten,” the man I would come to know as Raymond de Merville said as he let go of me roughly. “Now bring me to your father.”

“My father is in the Holy Land,” I replied evenly, “but I can take you to my uncle.” I felt all eyes rest on us as I walked down the street. Those gazes were nowhere near as sharp as the one pair of blue eyes that bore into my back.   

A hunter who had set eyes on his prey.

#

I did not know what my uncle Thomas promised the Norman. All I knew is that the soldiers stayed.

“This isn’t going to end well,” Anne said as we stood at the well three days after they had arrived. “We’re surrounded by vultures, Maeve.”

I focused on filling the bucket with water. “Don’t you think I know that? What am I supposed to do?” I glanced around. There were indeed soldiers around, just standing, watching, talking to each other. I wondered why they kept their armour on. The villagers certainly wouldn’t attack them.  

“I don’t know,” my friend sighed. “Why Blackwater? Why did they pick us?”

I didn’t reply. The rational answer was not what Anne wanted to hear: That Blackwater was the last hospitable town before the mountain pass, which at this time of the year would be suicide to travel. Large enough to provide for a small army, but not big enough to fight them. Christian enough not to invite being slaughtered by them, heathen enough to provide protection from the Gaelic tribes attacking Blackwater. Oh yes, we were the perfect victim. 

“At least they have been peaceful so far,” I said soothingly.

“For now. What happens when those monks of theirs look the other way?” Anne set down the bucket of water and leaned closer. “They’re soldiers, Maeve. Who have been on the road for too long. How long will it take for them to ignore their god once they start to feel restless?”

As if in answer to her question, he appeared. Seemingly out of nowhere. I sensed Anne’s sudden silence before I saw him. When I turned around, my insides clenched together tightly. “Sir Raymond,” I managed to say evenly. Those eyes. I started to think they cut deeper than the steel of his blade could.

“Maeve,” the Frenchman mocked, “such a heathen name.”

I wasn’t surprised he had found out my name; in a town like this, it wouldn’t have taken him long. “To you. Because it does not fit your image of a god… a god _you_ do not even believe in.” I was taking a risk here, based on skint evidence I had seen when they had taken their so-called bread and wine… meant to resemble blood and flesh, what utter foolishness.

I had been raised in the Christian faith, much as it might surprise you. I just didn’t care much for it.

“Daring,” he just said, “coming from a pagan.”

I should object, insist that I was Christian. “Pagans believe. Just not in what _you_ think is right.”

Anne shot me a warning look. Had Raymond de Merville struck me as the missionary type, then I would not have spoken so. As it was, I feared his godlessness more than I would have feared his true believing – at least his faith condemned murder. I was not sure at all that de Merville cared.


	2. Food to Ashes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: None (yet), really, unless you count propositioning. 
> 
> As I am sure you know, feedback is always welcome. :)

In retrospect, I was foolish and careless. I was determined not to let the invaders ruin our harvest feast, so I made a promise to myself to pretend as if they weren’t there. Not listening to the whispered warnings not to dance so exuberantly, to talk less heartily with the village men.

Nonsense, I told myself. I had always danced, not well but enthusiastically, and I had always talked to everyone openly, be they man or woman. We were in Blackwater, not in the royal courts of distant lands. For most of the evening and long into the night, I actually thought I had gotten away with it.

That changed when I went into the city hall’s storage room for more ale. I should not have gone alone.   

“How suitable your name is, after all.”

I stopped abruptly. I did not like how he made me feel, how his voice could tempt me to believe he was more than just a violent brute. “What?”

His hand on my cheek, travelling down to my throat. “ _Intoxicating_.”

I flinched back, out of Raymond’s reach. He scared me, no matter how hard I tried not to let it show. Too tall, too broad, too violent and harsh. He didn’t belong here and I wanted him gone, but at the same time the knowledge he never would go away easily twisted the knife in my side.

“Your uncle clearly failed in his duties.”

“What? He took good care of Ella and me when our father went to the Holy Land,” I replied indignantly. It was true, more or less – Thomas may not be a great man, but he was not a monster and he had tried to do well. I could not ask for more under the circumstances.

Either way, I was in no mood to have this discussion now, or any day, not with him. I clutched the small barrel of ale tightly in my hands. How had he even gotten here without me hearing him approach? I had not seen him throughout the evening, had dared to hope he did not care for “pagan” feasts. Had he been sitting, watching in the shadows this whole time?  

“He did not get you a husband,” Raymond replied coolly, his eyes on my breasts, my hips. “You are clearly ripe for one.”

He wasn’t the first to make such a remark. Though he was the first one to phrase it so bluntly, so salaciously. “That is for me decide, nobody else,” I muttered. Certainly not by him.  

Suddenly, my wrists were in his grip, the barrel in my arms that had served as a shield crashing to the floor and my body forced to arch against his. “Did you think,” he seethed, “I allowed your pretty sister to be off the hook without some form of recompense?”

No, not like this. I struggled against his hold, trying not to think of the tales I had heard. Of what men could do to women. I did not dare imagine what a man like Raymond could do to a woman like me; any woman, to tell the truth. “My sister was never yours to take in the first place!” I spat and pushed him away with all the strength I could muster. “Neither am I. We are not toys for you to pick up when you like and discard when you’re done with them. Perhaps your French women like it that way – I, for one, do not.”

He looked almost amused as he glared at me. “Wake up, sweetling. The world does not play by your would-be rules. The strongest win, and they take what they will,” he growled. His fingers were tightly woven into my hair, leaving me without leeway to flee. He was no more sober than I was, but the lucidity he displayed nonetheless made him even more terrifying.

“Then why haven’t you taken Jerusalem yet?” I whispered. I cried out when he released me so suddenly I stumbled.

“How could a heathen ever understand?”

“Do _you_?” I challenged. “Do you even understand? Your compatriots may be devout Christians, but I fail to see the same fervour in you.” My fate was already sealed; it was tied to this man for as long as he remained in Blackwater. I had apparently piqued his interest, for whatever reasons. Why should I not say what was on my mind? There were few things he could do to me that were worse than what I was already living through. Rather he brutalised me than my sister. That was my only goal now: Keep Ella away from them, keep her safe. 

“I have given enough for God,” he seethed. “I certainly don’t need to be lectured by a heathen girl like you.”

“I didn’t invite you to follow me,” I growled.

He looked at me again, and it reminded me of a wolf who had caught sight of delectable prey. “Oh, but you did, Maeve.” Suddenly he was too close to me again, one hand on my hip while the other took my chin firmly and forced me to look up at him. “The way you danced tonight… made it all too clear you wanted this.”

“ _What_?” My exclamation was close to a screech. I pushed hard against his chest, managing to at least get a breath of distance between us. “I dance how I please, not to please others. Let alone to invite… to invite _this_!” What did he think I was? Desperate? Property? Shameless? All of it?

“Maeve?”

I used Raymond’s split second of distraction to break free from his hold, just as William came in. Frowning at the scene before him, he slowly asked: “I just wanted to see… if you’re okay? We’re getting thirsty out there.”

Dear, sweet Will. He would never stand a chance against Raymond, but in this moment, he was the saviour I needed. My heart pounded loudly in my chest. “Sorry, Will – I got interrupted,” I added sharply as I picked up the ale and followed William out before the situation could escalate.

Back at the fire, I released the breath I had been holding. But I could not shake the feeling of Raymond’s gaze, his hands upon me. They haunted me even as I lay in bed.

#

For days, I dreaded leaving the house just for fear of seeing him, being alone with him. When nothing happened, I relaxed and went about my usual business.

Foolish, again. I had forfeited every right to call myself independent and smart. It took all of three days for the summons to come to our house. Asking – demanding – me to visit him. Supposedly because of the way I handled the distribution of corn. I suspected other motives.

“You wanted to see me?” I said tensely. Why was I asked, commanded, to be here? I was not the leader of this town. Politically or elsewise, I had nothing to offer. Certainly Raymond de Merville cared nothing for corn.

“Yes. Sit.”

I could have rebelled, could have refused. I decided to save my energy.

“Tell me about this town.”

I blinked in confusion. He sounded calm, almost interested. As if he had not forcefully made Blackwater his home and stationed his army of brutes outside our doorstep. “There is nothing to tell. It is a town, like so many others.” I would not spy for him, if that was what he was after.

“Certainly there is more to it.” That dangerous edge had returned to his voice, hidden by the deep baritone of his, but it was no less sharp for it. “This is Gaelic land, yet an English town is allowed to prosper, to be at peace. One might think you had a deal with the Gaelic heathens.”

“Not everyone tries to make a home by coming in, swords blazing and threatening every breathing soul. Some do try the diplomatic way, by talks and truces. _Cooperation_ ,” I added, knowing this might be dangerous. “We do not invade on their land, and they let us be. That is the only deal we have with them.” I was stretching the truth, and omitting quite a few facts completely. Raymond de Merville was in no way entitled to knowing them.

He sat down opposite me and waved at someone behind me. “Is that so.” Disbelief, veiled as its mocking opposite. I would have to try harder, if I wanted to be left standing by the time this game was done.

A plate of food was placed before me, next to a goblet generously filled with wine. I looked up, confused – was I to be his taster now, make sure nobody would poison him? I was tempted to poison it myself. “Eat,” Raymond ordered instead as another plate and goblet were put before him.

“I don’t-“

“Eat,” he repeated. “Allow me the indulgence of your company.” Blue eyes sparkling with mockery, and something darker.

“If it is company you seek,” I began hesitantly, “there are better choices.” What would ‘company’ even mean? This man made me uneasy, scared me even, yet my sinful pride would not allow me to do the sensible thing and back down. To disappear into the shadows and become invisible to him.

“That is for me to decide.”

It sounded final. With a sigh, I picked up my cutlery. It shamed me to admit it, but I was hungry and the food smelt good. I haven’t had wine in… years, I think. I hadn’t liked the taste then, but now it tasted like heaven. I couldn’t think about what Raymond might demand as payment for this dinner – it would have turned the delicacies to ashes in my mouth. I wasn’t worried about poison. If he wanted me dead, all he had to do was lift his sword.              

No, I worried about the demands. The feeling of entitlement, which he already possessed in abundance. If all it took for him was a village dance for him to think I was asking for male company at night, I dreaded to think what he might make of us dining together.

Lest you judge me, bear in mind that these were hard days, and the food before me was more luxurious than I had ever seen, smelled or tasted. Would I sell my body for it? No. Once again, I deluded myself by telling the rational part of me that my body had not been asked for in exchange.

Of course it hadn’t been, I realised later. Raymond de Merville didn’t _trade_. He _took_ , and if he was feeling generous, you got something out of it, too. _If_.


	3. Into the Dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for this one being rather short, but the next one will be not only longer but also explicit - so while I'm working on that, I thought I'd at least post something leading up to it. Hope you enjoy, let me know what you think. :) 
> 
> Warnings: None yet.

Raymond asked – ordered – me to another dinner in the next few days, but I made my excuses. Eating in his presence was akin to entering the land of faerie. You knew you shouldn’t take just one bite of the delicacies before you, or would forever be entrapped in their world, and yet you couldn’t help yourself. Easier to not even set a foot into his realm.

“Where are you going?” Ella asked as I pulled on my coat.

I smiled and kissed her forehead. “Tír na nÓg.”

My sister was not impressed. “It’s getting dark.” She fidgeted with her frock. “Is this really a good idea, Maeve? With those Normans watching our every step?”

“I believe they have better things to do than watch ‘our every step’, dear. Brandishing swords, bullying stableboys, then confessing to make it all alright again, that kind of thing.” I pulled the hood over my hair.

Ella still looked at me with a frown. With her petite frame, pale skin, the glossy chestnut hair and calm grey eyes, she definitely was the prettier one of us. Probably the more reasonable one, too, though her quietness had many a neighbour think she was a little slow-minded. Far from the truth. “As of yet, nobody knows of your relationship to the tribes. Would you really risk it?”  

I embraced her in a brief hug before I left. “I need to go, Ella. I will be safe, and back before the morning, promise.”

The night would be cold and clear. Orange turned to purple at the horizon as I made my way towards the forest. Towards my other family. Here was one of the reasons why Ella and I looked nothing alike: We were only half-siblings. Our last name was the same as we had one father, but our mothers were as different as could be. Her mother, Irene, had been a merchant’s daughter raised in Normandy. She was the one to raise me, too, as if I were her own.

My birth-mother had gone back to the forest she had come from soon after my birth. Yes, half my heart beat for this untamed wildness that was the un-Christianised Ireland. The tribes that still prayed to the old Gods; they were my family.

Whether my mother was still among them, I didn’t know, nor did it matter. I was part of them by blood, and they taught me much. In turn I kept their existence a secret, and warned them if danger loomed. Sometimes I brought them necessities I could come by more easily than they.

My feet trod lightly on the uneven forest ground. I did not need much light to find my way. An hour or so of walking later, I had found their small campsite. Unlike the Normans’, it was almost invisible. They did not need big tents to be at home.

“Maeve,” the leader greeted me. I could still remember when his black-blue tattoos had scared me, despite having one myself on my spine. I rarely got to see that one, after all, and had no memory of receiving it. I suspected it was a farewell note from my mother before she left.

“Dalách,” I replied and bowed my head.

After a moment, the bear-like man embraced me. “It is good to see you, granddaughter.”  

Ah, yes. One tiny detail about my relationship with the tribes, as Ella had put it? Their leader was my mother’s father.

I sat down with them at the fireplace, feeling calm for the first time since Raymond and his troop had come. Listening to their tales and songs lulled me into a trance-like state. Blackwater might be upside-down these days, but the forest remained the same.

Dalách sat down beside me. “Tell me of the foreigners.” Of course he would have heard. I sighed, took a deep breath and told him what I knew. The soldiers, the monks, the ominous rock that needed to get to Rome. Dalách laughed heartily when he heard that last part. “A rock? They came all this way for a rock?”

“I would happily throw another rock on top if they would just leave,” I sighed.

My grandfather patted my shoulder consolingly. “This isn’t hospitable country for their kind. They will be gone soon.”

For once, his foresight failed my grandfather, but I didn’t know that then. I kissed his cheek, said my goodbyes and made my way back through the pitch-black forest. I was never afraid of it. Nature was not scary: humans were. 

As Raymond de Merville proved all too readily. “You are out late, little bird.”

My heart stopped. “Or early.” I had almost made it to my doorstep. Dawn was yet just a thought behind the hills, the only light above us came from the stars.

“Is the queen restless?” he asked, stepping closer. I noticed his hands were ungloved; a rare sight. He had long, slender fingers. This somewhat struck me as incongruent to the image I had of him as a brute soldier.

I shook my head to clear those wayward thoughts from my mind. “Queen?” _Great, Maeve, do him the favour of engaging him in conversation, why don’t you?_

“Ah, yes.” He traced the intricate design of my cloak clasp with his fingertip. He might as well have traced the pattern on my bare skin for all the intimacy it conveyed. Fortunately, a Norman wouldn’t understand the meaning of this Celtic pattern. “There is little enough to do in this village, so I enquired about the origins of you….your name.”

I shivered, and it wasn’t from the cold.

“A warrior queen…” he mused. “I wonder if she was as thorny as you are?”

“Well,” I smiled sweetly. “She did as she pleased, had several husbands and wasn’t known for submission, so I daresay, yes she was.”

Wrong thing to say. My wit and tongue might have been quick enough for Blackwater, but I would have to be better if I meant to prevail against Raymond de Merville. His smile was lupine, and his fingers wandered to my jaw. “Ah, yes, she was said to be quite…nymphomaniac, no?”

The gods give me a knife to carve that smirk off his face.

“She is a legend. A myth.” I wrenched my jaw free from his hold. He had his hands on me all too much for my liking. “She isn’t real.” What I didn’t tell him was that I believed her to be very real. That Maeve had become a legend instead of history only because religions raged upon this island who did not like women in charge. She had power, so she had to be a fairy tale. There was no place for her in this world shaped by men.  

Raymond’s eyes wandered over my body as if he could see through the fabric. “But _you_ are real. As are your desires.”

I took two steps backwards just to be out of his reach. Needless to say, he followed me those two steps and brought the distance between us back to non-existent. I resisted the urge to push him away, to demand of him to say clearly what he wanted from me. “My desires, as far as they exist, do not in any way feature you,” I bit out through clenched teeth. Unless I counted the desire to murder him in his sleep.

He didn’t seem to hear me, or maybe he just wanted to ignore me. “You were talking about cooperation the other day,” Raymond said quietly, eyes fixed on my lips. “Tell me, Maeve, what form might your cooperation take?”

Oh, this was wrong, and very dangerous. I may not be versed in the art of flirting, wooing or whatever you might call it, but I did know the look of desire. Hungry, ravenous. Merciless, even. All of it was apparent on de Merville’s scarred face as he looked at me. Only his God would know why.

I struggled to regain my breath. “The form of words,” I replied firmly while fiddling with the door to my home. “I do not deal in goods or services, Sir Raymond.”

I closed the door behind me, not before hearing his parting words: “We will see about that, Maeve.”

#

The woman was up to something, that much was clear. There had been leaves in her golden curls, the smell of pine radiating from her soft-looking skin, the fatigue of a night spent awake in her meadow-green eyes. Where did she take the audacity from to defy him? She was a villager, with not a penny to her name. He was the son of a baron, general of crusading armies.  

Raymond looked at the shut door before him. Initially, he had believed to have this hoyden in his bed, mewling underneath him, within a few days. But Maeve had shown to have regrettably more backbone than that; and considerably less wantonness than he had originally attested her.  

Very well. He had other ways. And Maeve Blackhawk, for all her pride and stubbornness, had one weakness. One he would happily exploit.


	4. Victory and Defeat (NSFW)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, thank you for your kudos and your comments! :)
> 
> Now, about this chapter: As promised, it is longer than the previous ones. It is also more violent and sexual, so please proceed at your own discretion. If you think there should be warnings added, please let me know. 
> 
> **Warnings** : Non-con/Rape, sexual content, language.

It was when he watched her lean over the well, her dress clinging to her curves, that Raymond decided Maeve’s time was up. She had been given enough time to come to him willingly. Her resistance had become vexing, and had done nothing to assuage his temper. Maeve’s pride begged to be humiliated.

Just as well that her uncle had asked to speak to him today. Raymond listened to his halting demands – pleas they were, really – with distinct lack of interest. His mind was otherwise occupied; occupied with the way Maeve’s breasts had strained against her stays, reaching out to haul in the water bucket.

“You can have all you ask for,” he cut Thomas off as the other man was about to repeat his question. “If I get Maeve.”

Thomas blinked, fiddled with his coat. “I don’t understand, my lord.”

Suppressing a surge of angry impatience, Raymond forced a one-sided smile. “I think you do. I want Maeve, in every way she can be had.”

Rather than the scandalised outcry he had expected, Raymond got to see Thomas pause. Consider it. “I cannot give you Maeve. She is her own person…” Thomas sighed. Of all the women in this village, the Norman wanted the prickliest and proudest. “Perhaps you should speak to her directly.”

Raymond didn’t bother mentioning he had, repeatedly, and wily Maeve had slipped from his grasp every time. Presented with a choice, the girl had chosen the difficult one.   

“Tell your niece...” Raymond spoke slowly, revelling in the power he held over this whole village, all these people. “That if she refuses, I will tell my men to roam the village as they please. Starting with her younger sister.”

“You wouldn’t,” Thomas choked out. He was not a brave man, but he was not a cruel one either. Ever since his older brother had left, he had found himself burdened with more responsibility he had ever expected or wanted.

“Their tempers, their _lust_ , rise. I cannot keep them peaceful indefinitely. But,” Raymond sat down and sipped his wine, “I might be willing to pay a group of whores to keep them company, instead of your village girls. If Maeve is in my room _tonight_.”  His own hunger, his lust, would no longer sit still. The woman had teased him long enough, left his body aching with need for too many nights. He could compel her, physically, of course. But it would make the victory less sweet. Maeve had to come to him.

Naturally, whatever her answer to his demand might be, he would have her in the end. By force, if necessary. Maeve needed to be his. He had to have this rebellious heathen woman, tame her, control her. Break her, even. She’d whetted his appetite until it had grown into a ravenous, uncontrollable hunger. 

Thomas looked defeated. There was nothing he and his men could do against the armed forces that had accommodated themselves here, like parasites. Feeding off the weak. In a rare moment of bravery, Thomas tried to do right by his older brother by upholding the family pride. A valiant, if futile attempt. “Even if Maeve agrees… it will have been coercion. In a world where everyone is free to follow their hearts, to do as their free will tells them, she would never choose you.”

Raymond jumped up, jolting the table violently enough to spill the wine and send the goblets tumbling to the floor. “This is no such world, and I did not ask for your opinions. Make sure Maeve is where she needs to be, or your precious town will pay the price!”

#

“And?” I asked quietly when my uncle returned. He was supposed to deliver an ultimatum to the invading troop, to tell them to leave. They had sat here long enough; too long. It was as if Blackwater was slowly being choked to death by their hold. Every day, their grip tightened, and Blackwater seemed to dwindle. I felt as if the places I could hide from Raymond de Merville were shrinking.   

“They intend to stay,” Thomas said numbly.

Of course they did. The mountain pass wouldn’t be easy to cross for weeks yet, at best. We didn’t have weeks – tempers were rising. Tensions becoming loaded. Those men needed to be gone, and soon. “They can’t. Uncle-“

“He offered a deal.”

I blinked. “A deal? Well, what are the terms?” Surely, a deal was our best chance. A group of soldiers could not be detained indefinitely, there would be violence and worse eventually. Even sweet-tempered William was looking murderous these days.

What might those soldiers require? Food would cost us dearly, but it would be worth it to see them off. Perhaps they needed a guide; that could be provided as well. Many of our hunters knew the mountain pass, could navigate it like the back of their lover’s hand.

Thomas sighed heavily, and somehow I knew, in that moment. _I knew_. But I needed to hear it. “Uncle?”

“The deal… de Merville said that…”

My uncle’s uncertain manner drove me insane at the best of times; now it just made me sick, angry and apprehensive. “What. What did he say? Just put it plainly.”

Thomas sighed again, but then finally the words tumbled freely from his lips. “He said his men would ravage this town, starting with Ella. That they would bleed us all dry. Unless you, Maeve, were in his room tonight.”

Oh, by all the Gods. “No,” I choked. There had to be another way. How could one man’s desires dictate the fate of so many? I had eluded him for weeks. Would I be so easily defeated now?

“I am sorry, Maeve. Nothing else would persuade him… I warned him you might not agree to it.”

I huffed derisively. “Oh, yes, please. Go ahead and put all the responsibility on me. I have no power and no say, but when it is convenient for you, you can load all our fates onto my shoulders, can’t you?” I normally would never speak to my family this way, but I had reached my breaking point. I knew Raymond de Merville was not joking. He would allow every woman in Blackwater raped if I did not come to him. Burn our homes, torture our men, plunder our stores. What choice did that leave me with? 

I forced myself to calm down. Not very successfully. “You’re saying… that if I let him rape me, he will spare the town?”

Thomas looked helpless. “Maeve. Would it really be rape, in that sense?”

“What?!” I screeched incredulously. What else could it be? I certainly didn’t desire the man!

Thomas swallowed visibly. “I just meant… that I have seen how you are around him. That you have his attentions. And you have never been seriously involved with a village boy…”

“And that makes me automatically grateful for any man to have me, is that it? How could you, uncle!” I was not normally someone whose temper was easily riled, but this was horrid. The mere thought of that brutal soldier’s hands touching me, undressing me…. Of going to him. Letting him have his way with me, and all the while him revelling in the fact I had come willingly. _No_. That would be worse than the actual act.   

Thomas looked so defeated; I could almost pity him. I would have, had not I been the one offered on the sacrificial altar. “It was the only payment he would take, Maeve. We have nothing to offer, he knows that. We all know it. These negotiations were a farce from the start. His troops could have razed us to the ground already; they still can.” This was a rare moment of clarity from my uncle. Too bad it came too late and was utterly useless in this case. “But you…” When he took my hands in his it was all I could do not to flinch. “You, he actually wants. _Needs_.”

I very much doubted that his _need_ for me could not be satisfied by any woman, preferably a willing one. “So he says now. What is to stop him from letting his men violate us all the next morning? No. I cannot do this, uncle, do not ask it of me…”

Thomas smiled sadly, and he reminded me of my father, then. It was the beginning of my downfall. _Dad_.  “You are your father’s daughter. Unyielding. I cannot force you, Maeve. But I will tell you what he said to me. If you are not in his room tonight, he will let his men roam our village freely, unchecked. And he will have you anyway,” Thomas added quietly, almost as an afterthought.  

I tried not to flinch, to not be scared. But I would have been stupid not to be afraid. “So the only thing he really offers is the choice of _how_ I will be violated?” I could flee into the woods, and nobody would be able to find me, not even Raymond de Merville. I could not take the whole village with me, however. Even if I fled, I would have nothing to return to but ashes. 

“They are high in numbers, armed… trained. Even if they are defeated, by a miracle of God…more will follow.”

The anger that had propelled me these past days left me all of a sudden. I tasted defeat on my tongue, and it was bitter. Fear, apprehension, they weren’t sweet flavours. _Ella_ , I thought. I was a selfish woman, and I might have been tempted to leave the women in my town to the impending fate. But not my sister. If I did not comply, Raymond would take her first, and not gently. Not because he desired her, but to show me he had the power to hurt the one person I loved most. I knew it, and it was what made my feet walk that evening. Walk towards the house where he and his high-ranking officers were housed. 

It was a path I had walked countless times before, but this night it felt as if it would be the last time. I would lose more than my pride tonight.

#

“Maeve,” he greeted me. Lewdly looking at my body. “I am glad you made the sensible choice.”

“You are despicable,” I said lowly. The truth was, _I_ felt despicable. I was whoring myself. To save my friends, my sister, all these women; yes. It did not change the fact that I had agreed to be his whore. His _willing_ whore.  

“Take off your clothes,” he snapped, amusement gone from his expression and wholly replaced by merciless hunger. The goblet of wine in his hand surely wasn’t the first one.

I wouldn’t strip for him. If he wanted to see what was underneath, he could bloody do it himself. Being here was as much as I could be forced to do. I didn’t move. He wanted this, I did not – I would not do him the favour of giving the illusion of consent or even desire.

“Do not make me repeat myself.”

“I am not,” I quipped quietly. “If you feel the need to repeat your orders, that is your concern, not mine. I am where you told me to be – you will get no more from me.”

I had been young then, proud and obstinate. Reckless, with no small amount of disregard to my own life which I considered wasted from this moment on. Had I been older, wiser, I might have made this night easier for myself. Would not have provoked him to be rougher than his nature dictated.

“Very well,” he said evenly. “If that is how you wish it to be.”

My stays were ripped. He had moved so quickly I didn’t even register it until I felt the cool night air on my bare breasts. I wasn’t myself; rather, I stood beside myself. Observing what was happening and being unable to do anything against it.

Raymond growled appreciatively. His hands cupped my now bare breasts, thumbs expertly brushing over my hardening buds. Damn the cold. Damn him. “As pretty as expected. Such pert nipples.”

I hated my own body, in that moment. I hated him more.

I didn’t move as my skirts came off, and while it felt like hours as he stripped every piece of clothing from me, it really only took seconds before I was entirely naked before him. Being appraised like a piece of cattle. It was all I was, I realised then. An orifice to be fucked, violated, discarded. Everything I never wanted to become and was now forced to be.

His hands – damn those deceptively nice, slender fingers – travelled over my bare skin. Starting at the hip, circling around my waist as he walked around me. Came to rest on the tattoo on my lower back. I shivered, not pleasantly so, and not from the cold. Goosebumps appeared all over my arms, and yet – the touch itself was gentle.

_Don’t be stupid_ , I admonished myself. Raymond was appraising his prize, not making an attempt at being a tender lover. _As if tender was a concept he understood_.

His fingertips traced my tattoo. “What would the priest say about this, I wonder?”

I didn’t turn my head towards him as I spoke. “Why don’t you get him and ask? I am sure he would be very interested in this whole situation.” In fact, I didn’t hold our village priest in high esteem, but when did details ever stop me in making an unqualified remark?

I gasped when I felt my body pushed against cold leather, fingers digging into my buttocks. “I am sure he would be,” Raymond growled into my ear, lips grazing my neck. His beard scratched over my skin like a whisper, a taunting promise of what this could be if he were a lover rather than an invader. “Though I doubt his thoughts would be very priestly.” His lips’ attention wandered down to my shoulder, while his hand travelled over my hips, then to my groin… then between my thighs. “I doubt any man’s thoughts would be, presented such a sight.” Up his fingers went, parting my legs and resting on my mound. The feel of his hand so close to my inner core while not making a move yet to invade it was torture in itself. It messed with my head. Did I want him to touch me or not?

“Fortunately for you, my little heathen, I do not share.” 

“What a shame,” I bit out, “It might have been your one redeeming quality.”

I wanted to break away, to get as far away from his as possible – even if that meant running through the village naked. Anything but this, to be touched so intimately by a man I despised. Even if I wasn’t thinking about protecting my sister, even now in this moment, I couldn’t have fled. I was firmly pressed against him, his hard muscular arms holding me in front of him, at his mercy.

I could not see his face, could not tell if he had even heard me. “Why?” I simply asked, forcing back the tears. I hadn’t cried for years; Raymond de Merville would not be the one to break me.

“Because,” he murmured deceptively softly and pushed two fingers inside me, making me almost cry out, “you asked for it.”

I gasped for breath at the intrusion of my body, while knowing that this was only the beginning.  My own body betrayed me cruelly. I had come here on my own account; yes. I was willing to admit to that, twisted as that logic was – it was blackmail, after all. But, I _had_ come to him. And my traitorous body was reacting to his touch.

Raymond groaned in my ear. “Mhm. You’re a tight one.” His fingers started to move within me, pushing my arse against his groin, and I was at an absolute loss as to what to do. What to feel. I wish I could just leave my body for a while, and return when it was done – or possibly never. 

“Are you a virgin, my sweet heathen?”

I didn’t answer. Had I any words to spare, I would have only said “None of your fucking business”, and I doubted this would help my case.

I flinched, not entirely from discomfort, as Raymond started to move those damnable nimble fingers inside of me. Maybe if I pretended he was someone else… He continued talking in that lulling, deceptively smooth baritone of his: “I would guess yes, but who knows what you have been up to in these god-forsaken woods…” 

Involuntarily, I grabbed the arm he had over my breasts with both my hands, for leverage as his other hand wandered deeper into my core. He kissed my neck roughly in response, his teeth marking my skin.

That made me snap back into reality. As if my senses had sharpened by the realisation where I was and with whom, I felt everything in excruciating detail. Especially the defeat. 

Raymond noticed the sudden tension in my body and decided to end his toying with me. He released me roughly and pulled off his shirt. “Get on the bed.”

I didn’t move. Not because I wanted to challenge him, but because I was petrified. There was no escape for me, no alternative version of how this would play out. My eyes wandered to his bare torso, took in the scars, the muscles moving sharply underneath his skin. If Raymond had not been such a brutal man, he might have been quite handsome. Now the sight of him only terrified me, though I would rather die than let him know.

A cry escaped my throat when he suddenly was before me, hand in my hair as he tilted my head up and kissed me. There was no tenderness in it. Just lips on lips, his tongue forcing entry. As abruptly as it had started, the kiss, if it deserved to be called that, ended. It left a taste of wine on my lips, and for a brief, insane moment I wanted more. “Lie down.”

This time, I complied, if only because his tone promised repercussions if I didn’t. What remnants of humour he’d had were gone. I stared at the ceiling, but could not stop myself from glancing at him when I heard the last pieces of clothing dropped. At the sight of his hard, large cock, I almost cried. My body tensed and dried up at the mere thought of having him inside me. The size of Raymond would stretch and tear me, and there was no longer a drop of moisture between my legs to facilitate his intrusion. Was this what he wanted all along, I wondered.

I wished I could run. Far away, into the protective shadows of the forest.

Why had Raymond chosen me? Of all the girls in this village, what had made me stand out to him?

I noticed that his body was warm as I was buried beneath it; strange how such a cold heart could beat within this chest. His beard scratched against the tender skin of my breasts as he nipped at my buds with his teeth. I flinched, but didn’t make a sound. “Not so rebellious now, are you?” he growled and pushed my legs apart with his knee, settling between them. Raymond seemed even more imposing naked, without his armour; or maybe that was only because I felt infinitely smaller without my clothes.

“Wait,” I gasped as I felt his erection push against my entrance. I wasn’t ready to take him, despite his rough preparations.  

A malicious glint came to his eyes as he looked at me, a smirk on his lips. It was the caricature of a smile. “Oh, darling, I have waited long enough.” I realised my mistake then: I had pleaded. Shown the one sign of weakness he had been waiting for. This wasn’t about desire, it was about humiliation; I had just given him the opening for it. 

I cried out when Raymond sheathed himself inside me in one deep, relentless thrust. I pushed against his chest, dragged my nails over the scarred skin and tried to wriggle away – he made short work of my efforts by pinning my wrists down and holding me in place. I glared up at him in hatred, tears welling up in my eyes but not spilling. “Whatever god you believe in, I hope he will punish you for this.”

“God doesn’t care,” Raymond grunted as he thrust into me again. I thought I was coming apart at the seams, ripping. How could he be so warm, when I was shivering inside? Against my will, I was starting to get wet again. Perhaps it was only my body trying to make it easier for me; I didn’t know if I should be grateful for it. For giving him the satisfaction. “Not about little heathen sluts like you.”

“I am what men like you make me.” I managed to wrench one wrist free and aimed for his face, clawing like a trapped cat and cursing him in Gaelic. It only seemed to spur Raymond on further, if his groan was any indication. He grabbed my freed wrist and pinned it back down, biting my neck as he did. Marking me, as if I were some piece of property.

“You wanted this,” he rasped, “You asked for it every time you defied me.” What a perverted version of reality.

In an attempt to free my arms, I arched my back and twisted my hips. I should have remained still. Raymond groaned and rammed into me again, the new angle making me feel it all the more intensely. His hips pinned down mine, his whole body forming a cage around me.

I forced back tears as I realised the whole extent of my situation: unpleasant sex, I have had before (which woman hasn’t?); outright violation, however – rape, as my uncle would not call it, but which made it no less true – that was a concept I couldn’t grasp. Worse was that I had agreed to it. The worst was that even now, I wondered if I might not have gotten to this point without his threats; if I would not have eventually gotten into Raymond’s bed, had he left me with a choice.  

As it was, he hadn’t. I dispassionately felt his thrusts inside me, felt his beard scratch against my throat, his hand grab my thigh and push it up to my shoulder to give him deeper access. Were it not for my sister, I would have rammed a knife into his heart this instant. Consequences be damned.   

“Being inside you feels even better than I imagined,” he murmured in my ear as his thrusts picked up pace. “So many nights, you tormented my sleep... _dominated_ my sleep. This, now, is only fair pay-back.”

Raymond moved my wrists above my head to hold both of them down with one hand as his other moved to my hips. Fingers digging into my flesh, he pulled me against him. Murmuring my name like an incantation. Despite my initial interpretation, for him, this was not solely about humiliation. Raymond de Merville’s desire was very real, violent and dark as it was.

Throughout the ordeal, I couldn’t help but notice that he smelled nice, and that his physique would have been appealing if I had gotten to see it under different circumstances.

Things being as they were, his body did nothing but intimidate and oppress me, and I could barely stand the feel of his skin on mine. If he hadn’t been as muscular and well-trained as he was, maybe it would have been easier. Raymond was a soldier, however, and his movements were merciless and precise; and forceful. Every thrust to the point.

“You’re getting wet for me,” he rasped against my ear complacently.

I wouldn’t even dignify it with an answer. He clearly had his own reality, I wouldn’t waste any more energy on diffusing it. Why did he have to have the stamina of a soldier, too? His age should have put a natural limit on that, surely? I wasn’t sure how much of this I could take.

“Oh, my sweet tight little cunt… I am going to come inside you.” Raymond’s pace quickened in a more irregular pattern, his thrusts getting harsher, deeper as his control slipped.

He couldn’t think to…. No. This man would not be allowed to come inside me, not him. I had heard enough stories, I knew that what got girls into trouble was not sucking off a man’s cock, it was allowing him to spill whatever it was they spilled into your womb.

So, yes, of course I summoned every remnant of strength I had left and struggled. Protested, cried out, clawed away at him.

I understood quickly enough that he had not announced it for my benefit, but rather my final humiliation. To make me realise how utterly powerless I was against him. I was not a fragile, weak woman. My lifestyle prohibited it, as did my nature. But all my strength and skill meant nothing against Raymond de Merville. He held down my arms as if they were no more than branches in a light breeze, and continued thrusting into me. The perverse, sickening sound of skin slapping on skin filled the room. I wished I could close my ears as easily as my eyes.

Raymond came with a loud, satisfied roar.

_No_ , I pleaded, quietly, uselessly. If the gods had any mercy, they would not allow his seed to grow. Not within me. _Please, goddess_ … _Not this. Not his_.

I wiped at my eyes discreetly to smear the tears away, hoping he wouldn’t notice in his violent passion. I realised another mistake then: it wasn’t about humiliation _or_ desire for Raymond. For him, they were the same. How much pleasure this gave him, how satisfying it was for him to possess my body, use it as his pleasure. It made me feel sick. I had allowed a monster inside me.  

#

Raymond, of course, had different ideas when Maeve started to struggle. In a way he was glad to see the fight return to her eyes, along with the burning hatred. It meant she wouldn’t break quite so easily.

As he spilled his seed inside her, stayed sheathed inside Maeve’s delectable heat for another moment just to taunt her, he hoped to have put a child in her belly. He wouldn’t marry her, of course. Just force this pagan hoyden to carry his Christian child, to bear his son and be reminded every day of how she had yielded willingly to him, Raymond de Merville.

As he finally pulled out of her and fell onto the bed beside her, he patted her womb tauntingly. “Perhaps this will give you something to remember me by.” Being inside her, possessing her, had felt even more satisfying than in his dreams. She had fought, as he knew she would; but ultimately, she had succumbed. 

Maeve’s emerald eyes were cold, even when her voice was full of fire. “I would never allow any child of yours to be born.” She sounded as if she meant it; perhaps she did. She was not suicidal, not that; but there were ways. Pagans were more versed in them than believers, he suspected. Lives, even unborn ones, meant little to them. “I would take a knife to my own womb before I let that happen.”

He didn’t know what it was about her words that sent him into a fit of rage. Perhaps it was no more than the fact that she only spoke out loud what many other women must have thought. One had consented to marry him, years, ages ago. It wasn’t until after she had thrown herself off the cliff of the Northern French coast that he had found out from her nursemaid she had been expecting a child. His heir. Madeleine had been expecting his heir, and she had rather died than give birth to him.

Maeve wouldn’t do that. She would carve Raymond’s child from her womb, but she would never die for it. She didn’t consider him worth it. Her persistent pride and her contempt for him were unwavering.  

And so the final victory of the night was hers, after all.  


	5. A Raging Storm (NSFW)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I meant to include more plot in this chapter, but then I got a little carried away, so it has to wait a bit longer. Hope you'll forgive me. 
> 
> Feedback is welcome, be it comments, kudos, or a message in a bottle. :) 
> 
> **Warnings** : Non-con, language

 The stares were almost too much to bear. I wish I could go back, make myself mute, not a sound to pass my lips… but it had been torture, and torture will eventually break you. Pain will find a way to make you scream, to make you beg. I wasn’t strong. At least, not strong enough.  

Even if I had remained silent, Raymond wouldn’t have. Everyone within this house would have heard what had happened, even without the scraping of the bed on the floorboards.

I resisted the urge to look down at myself to check if my body was sufficiently covered again – as covered as possible with half-ripped stays, anyway – and forced my gaze to meet that of any soldier daring to look at me. 

“So am I next, lass?” One of them stepped forwards, his arm around my waist before I could react. Even now, in the dark hours between night and morning, he still reeked of ale; he apparently hadn’t given himself the chance of sobering up.

“Hands off.” A growl behind me. I hadn’t heard him follow me. “This one is mine. Get a whore.” The flip of a coin.

The soldier must have been extremely drunk still to dare risk Raymond’s wrath by opposing. “I was about to. This one will do.” Another grasp for my hip. I couldn’t exactly contradict him; this night _had_ made me a whore.

A blade was drawn beside me. “I said,” Raymond’s voice was low, dark, “get a _whore_.” He turned to the whole group of men assembled. “The village is not to be touched. If any of you has aching loins, go north – there are brothels in abundance.”

I could not deny relief lightening my heart. Ella would be safe. In this, Raymond had been true to his word. It was a testament to his leadership - or his cruelty, as I suspected to be more likely – that nobody rebelled openly. I could see it on their faces, though, the misgivings.

 _He clearly doused the fire in his loins. Easy for him to say now that he had his desires satisfied_.

I stored that knowledge away for a later time; a time where it might be of use. Discord could be useful, if preyed upon by an ill-wishing opponent; and that, I certainly was. It changed nothing about how I felt now. As if I had betrayed everyone I cared for, including my own principles. As if Raymond’s seed was still trickling down the insides of my thighs. Which it was.

I didn’t spare him or any of the men another look as I threw open the door and tried to drown myself in the cool darkness of the night.  

#

Getting up the next day was harder than I thought. After I had returned from de Merville’s bed, I thought the worst would be over. It wasn’t. I had just gone to bed and forced the images and sounds from my mind while trying to ignore the pulsing pain between my legs. Ella had come and read to me, told me stories. As if she were the older sister, not I. She hadn’t asked questions. In return, I hadn’t asked why she was still awake.

Ella had continued to easily chatter away as she prepared a hot bath for me, sat beside me as I washed away the touch of the invader’s hands. Tried to feel clean again… But there were spots even a bath couldn’t clean. The heart, the soul, the core.

Perhaps Ella had slipped something into the wine she had brought me at night. Wine itself was rare in our household, but she apparently had easily snuck it from the kitchens, and I had taught her enough about herbs and spices for her to recognise sleep-inducing herbs. Whatever she had done, I was grateful for the dreamless sleep I slipped into.

But morning came, and it came mercilessly.

“You took your time waking up!” Bea announced as she came in. Thomas clearly hadn’t told her of the deal, or he hadn’t realised yet I had taken it. My aunt placed a small tray with food and tea on my nightstand. “Ella mentioned you didn’t feel well yesterday. Are you strong enough to go to the market today?”

I nodded numbly, even though it hadn’t really been a question. I had never been sick, or frail as other girls. Sometimes, when he had had a glass too many, Thomas would blame it on my maternal heritage. Either way, Bea clearly didn’t believe anything to be the matter with me. Once she had left, I picked at the food. I had always had a healthy appetite – now I just wanted to throw up at the smell of eggs. I took the tea and nothing else.

Surprisingly, going out to the market was good for me. The fresh air cleared my senses somewhat, and once I realised none of the neighbours looked at me judgingly, I could breathe freely. Of course they didn’t judge _yet_ – they simply didn’t know. Fine by me, I thought. Perhaps nobody need ever know who had kept them all safe and how.

“Maeve!”

A hand on my shoulder, a human body too close to me. I jumped, nearly dropping the pumpkin in my hand. “Will! You startled me.”

Will Hawthorne frowned, looked me up and down. “Are you alright? You look pale. Ella said yesterday you weren’t feeling well.”

I thanked my sister quietly for her discretion, for keeping people away from me. “I’m fine. Thank you. Is your mother feeling better?”  

Will nodded absent-mindedly, assuring me Mary Hawthorne was back on the mend, thanking me for my medicine. I wondered if he would still be grateful if he knew where my knowledge came from. “Maeve, there is something I wanted to discuss with you.”

The seriousness in his tone snapped me back to reality. Will’s brown eyes were dark with worry, but his cheeks slightly flushed. “Oh?”

Will took my arm and pulled me to the side. “About the soldiers.”

Of course. It couldn’t be any other topic, not today. When I still felt the rough attentions of their leader inside of me. His loveless kisses on my neck, my lips. Bare skin against mine. “There’s nothing I can do, Will. My uncle cannot force them to leave, none of us can. If we do, we might face the wrath of not only a hundred armed soldiers, but of Rome as well. Our situation is precarious as it is. Half of Blackwater has heathen leanings or ancestors!”

“Including you,” he said under his breath.

I sighed. Will was one of the few who would say it so openly, who even knew of my true heritage. His older brother and I had once planned to get married – I had been practically part of the family. Then James had imagined himself to be a crusader, and he had left with sweet promises of a glorious return. I had told him then that he needn’t bother. Some days, I regretted my words. Most days, however, I convinced myself he had been old enough to hear the truth, and the truth was that he loved adventure and glory more than he had loved me; and that I would not wait for a man who would die for a God he knew I didn’t believe in.

Yes, I had been involved with a man. Had I been in love? Difficult to say. All I could say for certain was that I had been glad I had not been a virgin last night.

“We just need to keep them calm for long enough for the mountain pass to be free again. They will leave. Rome is all they talk about. Apparently there is a mysterious rock the pope wants.” I deliberately made light of the matter, as if I didn’t know exactly what they were doing here.

Will flinched slightly. My manner of speech was too careless for a Christian like him, but he didn’t call me out on it. It was the Blackwater way. You knew what your neighbours believed and didn’t believe, but you stayed well out of it. We had bigger concerns than what God we prayed to. At least, that had _been_ our way, before the Christian soldiers came.

Will knew as well as I did that our winters were harsh and long, and that the pass wouldn’t be fit to be crossed for a while. “That will be months, Maeve. They’re quiet now, but for how much longer? They’re soldiers.”

 _Yes_ , I thought. _Pacified soldiers, now that Raymond got what he wanted_. The prostitutes from the northern towns would be paid to keep their tempers down, for now. There might be women in Blackwater who would eventually be persuaded to share their beds, too. Not to keep the peace, but to maybe get a piece of gold or just a simple comfort out of it. They would do it quietly, discreetly. Perhaps some of them would even grow to care for one of the Normans. Whatever happened on that account, it would be their choice. They would not bear the shame; they would have gone willingly, had discussed it with their families. Or they were widows, who could do as they pleased anyhow.  

“James might never return,” Will was saying now.

“No,” I agreed. Neither might my father and brother. How could I love a God who persuaded men to leave their families behind to take back a meaningless city in the distant desert? “And I am sorry for you, Mary and Susan. But I told your brother when he left that I would not wait for him.”

“I know.” Will was quiet for a moment. His kind brown eyes drifted off into the distance before returning to me. “Maeve, I want you to marry me.”

I blinked. Surely I had misheard. “What?”

“I know it is unexpected. I wish I could be more romantic, to woe you. But I see the way those men look at you, their captain especially, and I cannot sit by and risk you getting hurt by them. Marry me, and let me protect you. As your husband, I could keep you safe.”

Oh Will. If you had asked me yesterday… what a difference one day could make. _Would_ it have made a difference, though? I would always wonder and never know. 

“I can’t.” Saying it hurt me physically.

It was William’s turn to frown and look confused. “Maeve-“

“I cannot be your wife. I care for you, which is why I cannot marry you. Please just leave it at that.”

“If it’s because of James…”

I shook my head. If only James _was_ the reason. How could I ever explain? But it seemed I wouldn’t have to. As if drawn by an invisible force, I saw him across the market square. Unaware my eyes had drifted, I only realised I had stared at Raymond when Will’s head turned to follow my gaze. Feeling our eyes upon him, or maybe just having a sense for opportunities of humiliation, Raymond looked back at us. Looked at me and _smirked_ , only one corner of his mouth lifting up and making his scar stand out more prominently. The explanation took care of itself then.

“Maeve. Tell me he didn’t touch you.”

Words failed me, for once. I was so tired. Will’s face hardened at my silence. “Tell me you didn’t _let_ _him_ touch you.”

“What difference would it make?”

I was saved from taking in every fraction of pain on William’s face by his sister Susan. Oblivious to the tension between us two, she pulled Will’s arm and shot me an apologetic look. “Sorry. Will, the lads need you to help with the sheep – I asked if it could wait, but…”

“No, I’m coming. I’m done here.” 

He might as well have slammed a literal door into my face for all the hurt his words caused. Little did I know this was only the beginning.

#

Raymond had not expected to see Maeve here in public, not so soon, anyway, and certainly not in the company of the young man who seemed far too fond of her for Raymond’s liking. Maeve was his now, and he meant what he’d said about not sharing. Seeing the other man’s expression turn to horror and repulsion as he realised Raymond had bedded Maeve was a small, but sweet victory. 

Briefly, Raymond thought to see pain in her eyes as she watched the boy leave with his sister. It was gone when she looked at him approaching. “Are you going to rip off my clothes and fuck me for all the village to see?”

“Would you like me to?”

Maeve huffed derisively. “Since when do you care what I like?” She pushed past him, careful not to touch him. He didn’t know why this realisation bothered him.

“Maeve.”

To his surprise, she stopped. Inclined her head to imply she was listening. He reached out to brush the curl of hair, come loose from her braid, from her neck. A soft, vulnerable neck. Her muscles tensed under his touch, but she didn’t jerk away. “I don’t have to hurt those who don’t fight me.”

Maeve was quiet for a moment, and he almost thought she had softened. “You wouldn’t have to hurt those who do, either, but you choose to.”

“And you wouldn’t have to fight me more than your pride dictates, but you choose to.” He managed, barely, to keep the anger from his voice, the incomprehension at her continued defiance. Of course Raymond didn’t expect her to be compliant all of a sudden, but he had expected her to yield more easily after the initial surrender. “We all make choices, Maeve.” Her hair was note quite like silk under his fingers; it was just a little too curly for that. Rather like finely spun linen. Gilded linen.

“I suppose we all have our reasons for them, too. I know mine, Raymond. But yours are unfathomable to me.” She finally moved out of his reach and continued walking down the street. As he watched her go, Raymond realised two things at once: it was the first time she had said his name, and the previous night had far from extinguished his desire for her, rather stoked it further. If he didn’t know better, he might suppose Maeve had bewitched him.       

#

“Goodnight, little one,” I said and kissed Ella’s forehead.

“Where are you going?” She looked up at me with wide eyes, as if worried about me. That was not her job, and I vowed to keep my little sister’s world intact even if my own was crumbling. “I need to go out,” I explained softly. Never would I tell Ella the truth.

The truth was that Raymond had asked for me; ordered me into his bed, if one were to be blunt about it. Not that Thomas would ever be blunt. My uncle preferred to not face unpleasant truths, and so he kept up the illusion that I was only keeping Raymond de Merville company for harmless dinners.

“There’s a storm coming.”

“I won’t go far,” I soothed her. “Are you warm enough?” I spread another blanket over her. It was my own, seeing as I wouldn’t be needing it tonight. I just hoped we had enough wood to keep the fires going in the main rooms.

Ella nodded. “Promise to be careful and be back tomorrow?”

“I promise.”

Satisfied for now, Ella curled into herself. “I love you, Maeve.”

“Love you too, little one.”

I wrapped my cloak around me and left. There seemed to be no sign of a storm, yet.

I passed the soldiers playing cards in the public room unnoticed. Just as I wondered if I should knock or barge in, the door opened and two soldiers stepped out of Raymond’s rooms. They were in full armour and barely glanced at me, though the younger one blushed as he saw me. Wordlessly, they disappeared downstairs. I wondered where they were going at this time of night, fully armed.

“Close the door behind you,” Raymond growled, breaking me out of my reverie.

My body relaxed slightly in the warmth of his rooms. Fires were blazing hotly, the light of the flames dancing over his face and creating the illusion of his scar moving.

Raymond handed me a goblet of wine, and I wondered at his unexpected hospitality. I would have thought that now he had me where he wanted me, there was no point in plying me with treats. “There’s a storm coming.”

The very same words Ella had used just moments ago. I hid my discomfort at this with sharpness. “Did you order me here to discuss the weather?”

He looked at me appraisingly. “You know that is not the reason.”

“I wanted to see if I can be positively surprised when it comes to you.” I drained my wine. Maybe it would make me numb. “Apparently not.”

“Your opinion of me seems so set in stone, I wonder why you still expect to be surprised.”

I wanted to hurl a snappy retort back at him but came up with nothing. “Tongue-tied?” He pulled me against him in one swift movement, my hips bumping against his. Raymond’s blue eyes on me felt hotter than the fire beside us. “Maybe this will loosen it.” Involuntarily, my lips parted and his tongue met mine in a hard, hot kiss. “You taste of honey…and rebellion,” he added with an amused smirk. It confused and worried me that he did not seem to dislike the taste.

Had I got it wrong? Would I please him more by defying and struggling against him than by being compliant and willing? I thought I had Raymond figured out, thought I knew how to endure his attentions and still be able to revel in the knowledge I did not give him that one last piece of me he needed for his complete satisfaction. Now it seemed my willingness meant little to him, when two days ago it had been all he demanded.

“Fascinating, how close sweetness and tartness can be, no?”

“Only one prevails, though,” I replied, “and both taste bitter if you expected the respective other.”

“Unless you enjoy the taste of both.”

Could I even win this struggle against that man? I let him untie my stays, still wondering what to do. I didn’t want to sleep with him, but perhaps complying was less desirable to him than my struggling. My head was spinning.

“You’re a beautiful woman, Maeve,” Raymond murmured as his hands slid over my naked torso. I wondered if I was not the only one slightly drunk from the wine. “Fascinating, too. Your soul is hard and cool, yet the body it lives in is soft and so very warm…” His fingers were inside me, and unlike before, they did not merely intrude for intrusion’s sake, but aimed for a very sensitive spot. Circled it and pressed.

“That’s it, my sweet heathen… get wet for me.”    

#

Raymond could see the puzzlement in her eyes as he told her that she tasted of honey and rebellion. He wasn’t even sure himself whether he wanted her surrender or her resistance, and maybe it was true what he told her: that one could enjoy both.

Her inner conflict was delicious to see. The torture he inflicted upon her by stirring her body’s capacity for lust; and oh, it was there in abundance. Maeve was not as brittle as she liked to pretend.

Her hair was like liquid fire. Shining brightly in all shades of the sunrise. He wanted to bury his hand in it and wrap those strands around his fingers as he fucked her.

Maeve would be on her knees tonight.

# 

I was about to lie down onto the bed when he was behind me and stopped me with his hands on my hips. His breath hot and intimate against my neck as I heard his rasping words: “Get on your knees.”  

I pretended not to hear, remained standing as I was. It seemed to amuse him. His fingers traced circles on my bare hips in deceptive tenderness as he spoke: “I know you weren’t a virgin when you came to me, Maeve.”

Forced _to come to you_ , I amended. I didn’t care he knew I had been sleeping with a man before being married. “How unfortunate that there are things even you cannot command.”

I heard him chuckle darkly against my shoulder. “You misunderstand me.” His fingers, again pressing against my core in slow, teasing motions. “I don’t care you were rolling in the hay with that peasant boy of yours. That he was the first to touch you with his clumsy fumblings. He is lying dead in the desert somewhere, and will never lay a hand on you again. You and your desires, Maeve, are utterly mine.”

How dare he bring James into this. I would not let him see he hit a nerve, or he would exploit it. “You know nothing of my desires.”

“I know enough to see I have awakened them, and that you crave their satisfaction.”

 _No, no, no_ , I told my body as I felt the wetness between my folds. It would make his intrusion, when it would come, easier, but I did not want him to believe I desired him.

Raymond’s voice was dark and smooth against my ear: “Now kneel for me.”

I wriggled in his iron embrace, all too aware of his hardness pressed against the small of my back. “No-“

“Don’t fight me, Maeve.”

Finally an indication of what he wanted. I regained my inner footing. “Then don’t force me to!”

He pressed his knees into the back of mine, making my legs fold. “ _Choices_ , Maeve. Make yours.” Raymond had me pushed onto the bed so quickly I couldn’t even try to put up a fight before I found myself on my knees, held in place with one of his hands on my hip, the other gripping my hair. His cock pressed against my buttocks, large and hard.    

“There is no choice in force,” I bit out. “Whatever you may do with me, Raymond, if I had a real choice, I would not be here.”

“Then there is little reason for me to give you a choice.”

He thrust into me, deep and hard. Mounted me like a stallion would a mare. I gasped, surprised at this position and how it made him feel differently inside me. At least I wouldn’t have to see the dark lust in his eyes as he fucked me.  

The storm outside drowned out my gasps of discomfort and his grunts of desire. The slapping sound of flesh meeting flesh in the steady rhythm of his thrusts.

At least, tonight I only had rage and discomfort to form a knot in my stomach, rather than their former companions fear and humiliation. It was a small comfort, but I was not going to be choosy in my situation.

I felt bruises forming on my hips where he held me, pushed me onto him, and I was glad they’d be hidden from sight. The marks Raymond left on my neck would be harder to cover up, but in late September, nobody would wonder at me wearing a scarf.

He took less time to find his release tonight. Gripping my hair tightly as he spent himself inside me, I had just one thought: I had to see a woman about conception-averting herbs.  

#

As soon as he had found his satisfaction in her, Maeve slipped from his slackened grasp and got up. She was not ashamed of her nakedness, carried it almost proudly, as she walked towards her discarded clothes.

Raymond stretched out on the bed and watched her, noted how her movements were not unlike a wolf’s: swift, to the point, soundless. Maeve wasted no energy on being graceful, and was all the more enticing for it.

“You could stay.”

Maeve shook her head, barely reining in a derisive laugh. Staying would just give him the opportunity to ravage her again when the fancy took him, and it would make stealing away from his room in the morning easier to discover. “I need to get back to my sister,” she said quietly.

“I doubt she needs you to hold her hand as she sleeps.”   

“You wouldn’t understand,” she muttered. Seeing his questioning look, Maeve sighed and attempted at an explanation: “Ella has no idea yet where I go when I am with you, and I don’t want her to find out by a gossiping villager who just happens to be up early and see me leave. Apart from that, it isn’t right that my sister sleeps in front of dying fires while I lie warm and soft in your bed.” Maeve struggled with the strings of her stays.  

Raymond meanwhile struggled to understand a more abstract concept than women’s clothing: the extent of sisterly affection Maeve had for Ella. What did the young girl have to inspire such fierce loyalty in her older sister? “It’s a raging storm out there. You’ll catch your death if you go out now.”

“I’m sure that would be an inconvenience for you.”

“Quite.” He wasn’t done with her, not even close.

Maeve’s smile was chilled, with a subtle note of smugness. “I’m willing to take that risk.” She clasped her cloak around her neck and dipped a mocking curtsy to him. “Goodnight, _my lord_. I trust _your_ sleep will be restful.”   

Damn the girl for shaping even the correct words into a perfectly aimed arrow at his peace of mind.

#

By late afternoon the next day, the storm had finally quietened down.

“The storm destroyed two bridges and the mountain path. It will take weeks to clear it, and we will have to wait until spring to do it.” The words that were delivered so matter-of-factly by my uncle over supper sounded like my death sentence. Raymond would not be gone from my life for months yet.

My hands shook as I stared down at my plate. “How do we know?”

“Two of de Merville’s men reported it.” Two men, armed, going out at night. Why go out in the night of an expected storm? To scout the area? It hardly made sense. They must have had other orders. 

Thomas sat down at the head of the table. “The upside of it is that the heavy weather uprooted trees that can be made into firewood. In fact, someone has replenished our personal stores already. Did you order it, Maeve?”

No, but I had a faint idea who might have – implausible as it sounded that Raymond could be capable of a thoughtful gesture like that. “Well, it must have been there before yesterday, or the wood would be wet,” I said to deflect the initial question.

“Maybe it came from de Merville’s stores-“

I shot Thomas a sharp look. Ella was listening. Ella, who wouldn’t have to lie shivering in her bed tonight because it seemed Raymond de Merville had the vaguest outline of a conscience.

 _Well, that’s just inconvenient_ , I thought with dry irony and took a bite of bread. _Next thing I know, he will be picking me flowers and writing me love poems. What to do with my carefully assembled, hateful anger then?_

I didn’t really think I had to worry: Raymond would give me many more opportunities to cultivate it.


	6. Paths To Be Tread (NSFW)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The usual warnings apply: It's NSFW, has sexual content, the nature of which is of dubious consent. 
> 
> Feedback in any shape and form is much appreciated! :)

Because of the storm, I had to delay my visit to the Wise Woman. Leaving the house after another night with Raymond, I just hoped it wouldn’t be too late.

“So it’s true.”

I jumped at the sound of a voice in the dark. “Will-“

“Don’t even try to deny it, Maeve, I was inside there, at the door. I heard you. Heard how he-“ his voice broke briefly, “heard how he fucked you.” The vulgar words sounded even uglier coming from him. The light from the window above us provided just enough light for me to see the hurt on his face. “How long has this been going on?”

I didn’t reply. What was “this”, anyway? Raymond desiring me? His propositioning me? Me whoring myself? Perhaps they were all the same, inevitably leading to this point. “Why are you here, Will?”

“I needed to see it for myself. All day yesterday and today I was telling myself I might have been mistaken. That I was seeing ghosts.” He laughed dryly. “I think I would have preferred ghosts. When I waited here all night, yesterday, and you didn’t come, I had hope again. Unfoundedly, it seems. Why, Maeve?”   

 _What right does he have to look hurt and betrayed_ , I thought unkindly. Then I remembered his brother, how there were happier days when James, William, Susan and I had raced over the fields in the summer sun, tumbling in the grass. Bruises from the falls of climbing trees, red lips from berries in the woods, the sound of laughter.  

I wondered if those memories of happiness were strong enough to stay alive under this strain. If they would be enough to make me remember what carefree happiness was. Or if this raging storm in my heart would consume them eventually.

Finally, I found my voice. “He would have burnt down Blackwater; murdered, raped, tortured us if I hadn’t agreed. I did it for all of you.”

William shook his head, running a hand through his hair in a gesture so like his brother. “You think you don’t need anyone, Maeve, but you’re blind. Just because you never felt a part of this town does not mean we would have let you go down on your own.”

I laughed mirthlessly. “Oh, come on, Will, we both know better than that. I am tolerated because of my father, but I am not loved. I don’t mind, because Blackwater and everyone in it is my home. I made this sacrifice for all of you-“

“We did not ask you to make this sacrifice! And believe me, nobody will see it as such. To be honest, I am not sure _I_ do. Had you refused his offer, we would have helped you, stood by you. Now that you spread your legs for the invader, you’re on your own, and I don’t think you can expect much kindness or even gratitude for what you did.”

The injustice of his interpretation smarted less than the realisation William’s words held some truth, too. I was on my own. A mean thought came to my mind then, too late to be of use to me: I should have taken Ella into the forest and let Blackwater burn.

I pulled my cloak more tightly around me against the chill of the night. Inside of me, however, a fire was burning. “None of you stepped up, William. You all complain about the soldiers, but none of you actually acted. I did! Don’t make me the sinner just because _I_ protect what I love. Whatever it takes.”    

#

I didn’t sleep well that night. For once, it wasn’t Raymond’s fault, at least not directly. The disgust and betrayal on William’s face haunted my dreams, and burnt behind my eyes even when I opened them.

I rose in time with the sun. It still wasn’t early enough to avoid my aunt. “Where are you going this early?” Bea asked reproachfully as I slipped on my cloak.

“Morning walk. I couldn’t sleep.” It wasn’t even a lie. I didn’t have to divulge the exact reasons for my insomnia. 

She frowned, but found no argument against it. “Be back in time for mass!”

“Of course,” I replied, having no intention to do so. Unless prayers averted pregnancies, I had no use for church.

There was no path that led to the Wise Woman’s hut in the east. You either knew where to find her, or you didn’t. In that, she was very much like my tribal relatives. My feet found their way almost trance-like to her home, hidden amongst trees and invisible to the untrained eye.

Despite her awe-inspiring reputation, reclusive living and imposing presence, the Wise Woman was a hearty woman who in her former life was called Beth. It had taken me years to find that out, and even more years until she allowed me to call her so.

“If it isn’t my little sparrow,” she greeted me. Despite my overtowering her by almost a head’s length, her childhood nickname for me stuck. “It’s been a while since you visited.”

“Not by _my_ choice,” I muttered. “The Normans are still besieging us. It’s harder to slip away unnoticed and unfollowed.”

Beth huffed and waved me inside. “They’ll be besieging you for a couple of months more, I reckon. This winter will be a brutal one, mind my words.” She didn’t seem worried about spending such a season alone in the woods. “As for slipping away, do those soldiers have nothing better to do than follow young girls around? Don’t answer that, I can imagine they don’t. Menfolk are troublesome. Never saw the appeal in marrying one of them.”

I smiled, for what seemed the first time in ages. “They probably reciprocate the notion, Beth.”

The older woman cackled. “You’d be surprised, little sparrow. I had many a suitor in my younger days – of course they all changed their minds when they realised I wouldn’t submit to their rules, and that I wouldn’t shy away from slipping them a potion that would make their cocks limp for days!” Her bosom heaved with laughter at the recollection of her youthful tricks.

I perked up. “Are there such potions?”

“None,” Beth replied, “but they didn’t know that.”

I sighed. There went _that_ easy solution of my problem.

“So how do I deserve all this?” Beth motioned to the basket of food I had brought. Her sharp grey eyes seemed to bore into me. 

“I need herbs.” No point beating around the bush. “To avoid a pregnancy.”

Beth raised her eyebrows. “Got yourself a lover, little sparrow? Don’t say you need them for a friend, you wouldn’t look so grim about it were that the case.” She tapped her fingers on the table between us. “Now, the last time you came to see me about this, your eyes were shining with excitement and you had the most delightful blush on your cheeks. Now you rival Nemain for belligerence of expression.”

I shrugged. Nemain, the goddess of the rages of war. An apt comparison. “If I had her powers, I would not be here asking for your skill.” I let out a frustrated sigh when this would not satisfy her. “I find myself… in a situation where I am not in love, but in need of your help regardless.”

Beth snorted. “No need for flowery words here, Maeve. You’re bedding a man you’re not going to marry, and you don’t want a babe to come out of it.” Perhaps seeing the vulnerability underneath my war-face, the Wise Woman softened. “Is it that commander of those Normans?”

I flinched and looked at her with eyes wide. If she had heard of it, out here in the depths of the forest… But Beth soothingly continued: “Don’t worry, girl. I have sources unavailable to most, and am a better listener. I see without watching, where others can observe for hours and see nothing.”

It was a relief to unburden myself to someone who wouldn’t judge. William’s expression still haunted me. “Do you think I did the right thing, then?”

“In sharing an invader’s bed to protect your family?” Beth shrugged. “Only the gods would know. It’s done, little sparrow. You can spend the rest of your life agonising over whether it was right or wrong, but in the end, only you can judge over that.” She took my hand and turned it palm upwards, tracing the lines there. “Is he good to you?” 

A bitter laugh escaped my throat. “Goodness is not a concept Raymond de Merville is familiar with.”

“Or you choose not to see it.”

Was she joking? “Beth, he raped me, he is ordering me into his bed like some common whore-“

“He’s only exerting the power over you that _you_ have given him. Exploiting the one weakness you have shown him, and that’s your sister. He’s a man, and a soldier, what did you expect? And since when do _you_ care about standards of propriety?   

“Since it’s threatening to take everything from me!” I exclaimed, more emotionally than intended. “William knows. I’m scared of Ella finding out, too. Why are you defending him, anyways?!”

“I’m not defending anyone.” Beth patted my hand. “I am trying to save you from being consumed by a rage that will never be appeased. If you don’t make your peace with your decision, it will push you into an abyss that you will never climb out of.”

I didn’t have the mind to listen to her wisdom, if it was deserved to be called that. Beth had no idea what it meant to be violated by Raymond whenever the fancy took him. To feel my own body reacting to him. “Whatever I feel will be appeased once he is gone. I don’t care in which manner. As long as he is _gone_.”

“Tell me, Maeve,” Beth said in a conversational tone as she set about her work bench, mixing herbs, “if this… Merville hadn’t forced you to be his mistress, would you feel this passionately hateful?”

“Hard to say in retrospect, isn’t it? All I know is that I wouldn’t have been his _mistress_ willingly.” There was an euphemism if I ever heard one.

“You are now. Accept it, perhaps even allow yourself to find pleasure in his touch. It will make it easier.” Beth set a small bag of herbs in front of me. “But I can already see you won’t. Even now I can see that behind those green eyes of yours, you are plotting his downfall. Your kindness, Maeve, has always been one of your strengths, as has your level-headedness. Do not let Merville take them, too, by allowing yourself to be consumed by this hard-hearted anger.”

I emptied my cup of tea. The truth that I didn’t want to see was: This hard-hearted anger had been smouldering for a while, and found its convenient point of focus in Raymond.

“Merville is not your father and not your brother, nor is he James. He’s also not your uncle, who will never be the man his older brother is. Hate Merville for what he does to you, by all means. But do not burden yourself further by heaping all the injustices done to you onto him.”

Wise words, certainly. Helpful, they were not. The men who had deserted me in life were out of reach, possibly forever – Raymond, however, was within reach. He was a lesser man than my father, brother and lover ever were, of that I was certain. So if and when I made Raymond pay, it would not be an injustice to draw retribution for _their_ failings from it. 

Beth sighed, probably realising her warnings would not be heeded. She pointed at the satchel of herbs in front of me. “Brew a pinch of those in one cup of hot water. Daily.” She pushed a steaming cup towards me. Pungent vapours rose from it. “That’s your dose for today.”

I pinched my nose and frowned at the concoction before me. “It smells vile.”

“Less vile than a babe’s sodden swaddling clothes.”

I rolled my eyes. No need for flowery words, indeed. “Bottoms up, then.” It tasted even worse than it smelt. I added it to the long list of atrocities Raymond exerted upon me.  

#

I did not return to the village as unseen as I had left it. Not that it mattered; I had what I wanted in my pocket.

By now, I was certain that Raymond had spies all over Blackwater, or alternatively made a deal with the devil. His ability to find me was uncanny. “You weren’t at Sunday mass.”

“I leave it to those who have sins to confess,” I smiled coolly.

Raymond’s mouth lifted into a one-sided smirk. As if he remembered a previous life in which humour was no stranger. “You know, my little heathen, that _pride_ is a sin.”

“As you so sharply observed, I am heathen. I can elect to ignore scripture on that detail.”

“As, I am sure, you ignore it on many other accounts.”

“Not yet, though I am seriously contemplating disregarding the part about not murdering thy neighbour.” My smile would keep butter from melting on a summer’s day.

I was not at all prepared for Raymond’s next move. Which was to hoist me up against the wall and kiss me, hard and passionately. Shock and surprise made me part my lips and allow his tongue against mine. “What about lust and wantonness, _mon petit faucon_?”

My sight had trouble focussing. I could feel the rough stone against my back, his fingers digging into my thighs as he held me against the wall. In public, for anyone who walked past to see.

His mouth was on mine again. Grasping for balance, I wrapped my arms around his neck, all the while thinking _stop, stop, stop, get away_.

Enjoy his touch, Beth’s words echoed in my head. _No, no, no, I wouldn’t_. I broke away, gasping for air and pushing against his chest to bring distance between us. My breath was quick and shallow, and I hoped my cheeks did not betray the heat they felt.  

Raymond tucked a loose curl behind my ear, almost as if he wanted to restore propriety to my  dishevelled appearance. “Seems like now you _do_ have something to confess.”

#

The discomfort eased with every time Raymond took me. The disgust at myself and revulsion didn’t, the ensuing guilt and shame. I hated him for doing this to me, and I hated my body for giving him the illusion of accommodating him. My mind felt no desire for him, but it did not stop my core from getting wet when he undressed me, when his hands wandered over my naked body. When his hard, large cock entered me, thrust back and forth. 

He was kinder, after that very first night. While that did not make the intercourse exactly pleasant, I realised that it could be worse. Yes, Raymond was much older than I was, but he was handsome, clean and trim. His kisses tasted of expensive wine and a spice I didn’t know; his skin smelt of leather, pepper and a breeze blowing in from the sea. Lean, hard muscles held me firmly where he wanted me, pressed against the soft curves of my body. It could have been worse; and it could have been better. At least, he now sometimes deigned to retreat from my body before he spilled his seed – not always, though.

I was neither petite nor fragile, but it felt as if his manhood stretched me to a painful breaking point. I tried to make it easier by forcing myself to relax; but force and relaxation were bound to clash. If only he allowed me to feel desire for him…

All throughout, I wondered what it had been that had made him choose me. There were easier, sweeter, prettier girls. If youth was what he fancied, there were even girls that were younger than I was and yet had more to offer in terms of experience. Not that I wished my fate upon them; I merely wondered. As long as it wasn’t Ella, I did not care what I had to endure. 

I just wanted to leave when it was over, but he would not let me, would expand the shame and disgrace as long as he could. That part, at least, I quickly decided to make easier for myself. Even more so once I realised Raymond was more forthcoming after he had fucked away all his pent up rage and desire. “Your scar…” I asked that night. It had been some weeks since I had first been ordered to come to him. Rarely a night passed where he didn’t summon me.

“A Saracen blade. We were fighting to take back Jerusalem.”

“I am sure your God appreciates your sacrifice,” I muttered sarcastically. What senseless slaughter. Jerusalem, though I had never seen it, could hardly be more than a city like any other. Buildings, stone upon stone. Made holy by nothing more than a group of men deeming it so.

He handed me a goblet of wine and got back into bed beside me. “ _My_ God? Is he not yours, too?”

Here was a tricky element of being with Raymond: For all his brutality and roughness, he was not senselessly cruel. He had a sharp mind, and he did not seem to think me absent of one myself. Often, like now, he would even invite it. I did enjoy it, being able to talk, to speculate without worrying who might call me a witch and heretic. “Not really. My father abandoned us to fight for a God nobody has ever seen, and people deem it honourable. Is it? Would it have been less honourable had he stayed here and taken care of his two daughters, of the villagers who depended on him?” I paused. I loved my father, wherever he was, and my brother who had gone with him. “I cannot help but wonder when this God that so many people fight for…when will He fight for them in return?”

“Never, my sweetling,” he answered in a rough, rasping voice. “He never will.” His fingers were brushing through my hair, almost absent-mindedly. Our bodies were naked underneath the blanket, his body radiating welcome warmth on a cold night; not that I would ever admit to it. Over the past weeks, I had gotten almost used to feeling his bare skin on mine, the move of his hard muscles against my softness. I had stayed the night more than once, and woken up beside him; gotten used, almost, to someone sleeping beside me. 

His reply didn’t exactly shock me. “Then why are you here? Why this quest to transport a rock from here to there?”

Raymond laughed, drily. “Because centuries ago, some men called this rock holy, so now it is,” he replied with biting sarcasm. It surprised me, that he would speak of his sacrilegious doubts so openly – but then, I was only his whore. Considered a heathen, to boot. My words would hold no weight, if I ever spoke them to a higher authority. He had nothing to fear from me. At least he was honest with me; that felt surprisingly good. He told me his secrets, his potential pitfalls.

“What a waste of energy, of time… of lives,” I muttered. If it weren’t for that blasted rock, I would not be here now, warming a crusader’s bed. 

Raymond played with a curl of my hair, threaded it around his forefinger as if he enjoyed the feeling of it on his skin. “I would agree, but that would be sacrilege. Perhaps _you_ should speak to the Pope.”

I huffed derisively. “Because Jesus listened to a whore, you think the Pope will, too? Or am I to spread my legs for him too, as part of one deal or another?” I had crossed an invisible border, apparently. “Careful,” Raymond snapped harshly as his grip in my hair painfully forced my head back. “I do not share what is mine, Maeve.” 

I didn’t move. I had seen evidence of his possessiveness. It was enough for one of Raymond’s men to even look at me lewdly for him to be demoted. Why Raymond bothered, I did not know nor would I ever ask. I just wanted him and his troops gone for good. To have my bed, cold as it may be, to myself again.

His hands travelled over my body, his mouth wandered from my neck to my breasts. I wouldn’t lie naked beside him given the choice, but his kisses were erotic, I was willing to admit that. “Open your legs for me, Maeve.”

I closed my eyes. For a moment, I had thought him to be more than just a lusty invader who enjoyed making people who were helpless against him dance to his tune. That should teach me better.

It was easier to not care. It had become apparent there was no winning this macabre game he played. The best I could hope for was a stalemate, where I would endure but not break. So I didn’t protest, didn’t struggle; I just let him push me down onto the mattress again. Bare skin on mine, which was bearable… then, intrusion. Less bearable, but almost swift in comparison to the first time he had taken me.

What did he want, I wondered as Raymond started to move inside me. There were women even in our village who would have given him the illusion of enjoying his attentions; they might even truly have. He was not an unskilled lover, I supposed, if one excluded the whole matter of the act being solely for his pleasure and not mine.

Yet he chose to bed _me_ – rape me, though nobody would deign to call it that, not in this time and place.

There was something he must want from me, something only I could give. If I could find out what it was, I might use it against him. But I was no closer to finding out what that was than I had been eight weeks ago.

#

Either William had tattled, or gossip would just always find its way. The details didn’t matter, what mattered was that my dirty, shameful secret was irrevocably out. 

It was William’s mother who started it, the woman my herbal knowledge had cured. When I passed her on market day, she did not return my greeting, but spat at my feet. “ _Whore_.” Mary may be elderly and frail, but her voice carried; weight and volume.

I stood paralysed. The woman who looked at me in such repulsion was one I had known all my life. The actions that made me a whore in her eyes had been to save her, and her children. My throat was dry as I realised that it took but one misstep to undo a lifetime of good. “Mary-“

“Do not speak to me, you Babylonian harlot!”

We were attracting attention now. “You don’t-“

“Oh, I understand perfectly well. How you spread your legs for the Norman!”

I could never reason against such spite. And as such, my world that I had given everything to protect was starting to crumble around me.

#

Hand in hand with pride came stubbornness, at least where I was concerned. I would be lying if I claimed I was unaffected, but I would not let anyone have the satisfaction of seeing my pain. I could yet salvage my reputation. I did not know yet that a reputation was easily lost but rarely regained. That realisation would only come much later. So for now, I did not let the snide remarks of neighbours and former friends get to me, walked through Blackwater with my head held high.

I even attended Sunday mass.

Admittedly, I sat in the very last row in the hopes of not having to hear much of the sermon. It seemed I shared the notion with my tormentor. “So you do have sins to confess,” he murmured as he sat down beside me.

“I want to familiarise myself with the scenery. I’m considering joining a nunnery,” I replied in an easy tone, not even acknowledging his remark. “I wonder what your God would make of you ravishing a nun.”

His fingertips brushed my thigh fleetingly. I could see his smirk from the corner of my eye. “I might actually be worried, if I were not entirely certain the constricting walls of a nunnery would drain your spirit more effectively than I ever could. You would _wither_ , and you are smart enough to know that.”

I mumbled some Gaelic obscenities referring to what he could do with his estimation of me. 

Any further discussion between us was cut short by shushing noises from the people around us. The priest had appeared at the front. I rolled my eyes but was glad for the reprieve from Raymond’s lewd comments.

After twenty minutes, I had to admit his remarks were more entertaining than the priest’s sermon. One of the many reasons I tried to avoid church where I could. It was the same story over and over again. I could barely keep my eyes open.  

“Come with me,” Raymond murmured hoarsely against my ear, his lips brushing my auricle.

I didn’t move, lest the slightest twitch would attract any attention to us. People, even the firmest believers, got bored in church. Who wouldn’t, listening to a man droning on in a language they couldn’t understand for over an hour? Between the benches, gossip was spread, deals made, romances prospered.

“Unless you prefer to listen to the good Father go on and on about the pitfalls of lust?” 

I knew for a fact that the priest was actually talking about the betrayal of Jesus by Judas, but I wouldn’t let Raymond know I had rudimentary grasp of Latin. My father was a very lenient man who enjoyed feeding his daughters’ hunger for knowledge. “Is that what he’s saying?” I replied dispassionately. “I thought that had been his lecture last week. It sounds all the same to me.” That much was true: Christian teachings were all so horribly dry and patronising.

“So there’s nothing to keep you. We both know you aren’t sitting here out of divine devotion.”

“Maybe I’m enjoying a spiritual respite, one that you keep imposing on.”

“Unless you want me to impose on your so called respite by pulling you onto my lap and having you right here, I suggest you come with me now.”

Despicable tyrant. “Even _you_ wouldn’t dare,” I snapped with more certainty than I felt.

The hand resting on my knee slowly slid up, taking my skirts along with it, inch by inch. “Are you willing to take that risk?”

“Fine,” I relented with a hiss. The elder women in front of us had turned their heads reproachfully at our continuous whispering. I didn’t need more attention. “Just wait a moment before following me. I don’t need to make my situation more blatantly obvious than it already is.” 

Raymond looked at me with a sarcastically amused expression, but he did as I asked him. Discreetly, I disappeared from the congregation. Outside, I took a few deep breaths and steeled myself for another rough tryst.

The snow muffled Raymond’s steps, and I flinched in surprise as he was suddenly beside me and took my arm. Directed me the opposite direction of his quarters, towards the forest. His grasp wasn’t forcing, but directing.

“Are we taking a scenic detour?”

Raymond didn’t reply, just continued to drag me through the woods. The snow didn’t facilitate our progress through the undergrowth, and I decided to save my breath as I puffed along behind him. Finally we stopped at a crossing – or at least what was a crossing in better weather conditions. Now it was just a random place in the woods. “Which way to Carlow?”

I took a deep breath to recover from the hike, then asked incredulously: “You pull me out of church to ask for _directions_?!”

Raymond whirled around and was suddenly very close and very intimidatingly in front of me. The mists of our breaths mingled in the cold air. Snowflakes fell from the trees above us in a slow dance, and not a sound was to be heard except our heart beats, so close to each other. “I brought you here _now_ to save the remnants of your reputation that you claim are so important to you. Though why you care for the opinion of such small-minded people is beyond me.” He released my arm. Twisted logic it may be, but I grudgingly agreed that dragging me into the woods when everyone else was busy listening to Father Carl was preferable to doing so when they were all gathered in the market square. “Now reciprocate the favour by telling me which way Carlow is.”

I looked at him more intently than I had in a long time. Took in every minuscule detail of his face: the deepening lines around his eyes, the silver in his beard. I wondered how old he really was; a man of his standing must be close to forty at least, but he had the passion of man half that age. Why did he need to know the direction of Carlow?

I sighed, relenting. This information cost me nothing. “That way.”  I pointed to the northern road. “It will take at least three weeks to get there, probably more in this weather. And one of the bridges destroyed in the storm was the northern one, so whatever you’re planning will be delayed even further.” What he wanted in Carlow, I couldn’t guess. It wasn’t even in the direction of Rome, and it had no ports to take him there, either.

“Are there any other ways to Blackwater from there?”

 _From_ there – so it wasn’t him going to Carlow, rather him expecting someone _coming_ _here_. Interesting.

“No.” I shook my head. “You may have realised Blackwater isn’t the trading hub of the world. We rarely have strangers, and we _do_ prefer it that way.”

Raymond’s feverish insistence ceded. He turned his gaze from the northern road back to me, lips turned upward in a smirk. “Sounds like far too boring a life for you, _mon petit faucon_.”

 “I had no complaints so far. I don’t see why that should change.” I headed back the way we had come.

Raymond’s tone was almost playful. “So you never wondered what your father and brother got to see on their way to the Holy Land? What Rome looks like?”

I pushed a twig out of my way. “Probably like an arrangement of houses inhabited by men with a literal holier-than-thou attitude. I think I can die contently without having seen it.” 

If I didn’t know better, I would have mistaken the sound behind me for a chuckle. “Rome is much more than that, Maeve.”

“Fine, I can add ‘cesspit’ and ‘shabby den of Christianity’ to the list if you like. Perhaps even ‘origin of everything that has ever enslaved my country’-” My words were cut off. Raymond had grabbed me from behind and pushed me up against a tree, closed his lips around mine. The violence in his kiss was almost desperate in nature. 

This should teach me to be on my guard always. I had let my vigilance slip and was promptly punished for it. _Punished_ , _yes_ … I thought as my lips parted.

Aware of his hands on my thighs, I was too dazed by the ferocity of the attack to realise that they were pushing up my skirts until I felt coldness sharply on my bare skin. “Raymond- not here!” I gasped. That wasn’t the protest I had intended to voice. I sighed as his kisses covered my neck feverishly. “Anyone could walk by-“

“The only one who really walks these woods is you, Maeve, as you well know.” And my tribal relatives, but I could hardly tell him that. If they would see me like this… Pinned against a tree by the general they despised, wantonly spreading my legs around his hips. They would slay me alongside him, and I would not even blame them. I was betraying them more profoundly than I was betraying Blackwater.

“But-“ My protests were drowned in his kiss. Much like the time he had cornered me in the market, I found my own arms locking behind his neck for leverage. I didn’t want be in a position where I was even more at his mercy than I usually was, but to some degree it was liberating knowing I had to touch him in order to stabilise myself.

Pinning me to the trunk with his hips and holding me up with one arm, his other hand wandered to the crotch of his trousers. Our pants were short and breathless against each other’s lips. I knew I should feel cold, but the truth was, the sting on my bare skin was melted away by an internal fire I did not want to experience. It burnt regardless.

Raymond didn’t bother with preparing my body with his slender fingers this time, but it didn’t make his intrusion any rougher despite that. I had gotten sufficiently wet already. He groaned against my neck as he buried his hard length inside me. Did a moan of my own escape my throat? Possibly.     

My fingers dug into his muscular back as he thrust into me in a by-now-familiar rhythm. Perhaps it was a little more frenzied for the fact of us fucking up against a tree in the middle of winter and we could be discovered any moment.

“Fuck, Maeve,” Raymond cursed as his thrusts came in quicker succession. His kisses had trailed to my throat, had turned into bites on the soft flesh of my breasts. I didn’t mind the pain; at least it drowned out the one caused by cuts on my back from the rough bark, and his head against my chest meant I could bury my hands in his hair. I rarely had my hands free to do so when we had sex. Curiously, it felt more intimate than the loveless kisses we had shared.

Raymond’s pelvis crushed against mine, my head was forced to the side by his grip on my hair, and my traitorous body had nothing better to do but lock my legs behind his back and allow him deeper inside me. His cock angling for a spot inside me that was dangerously close to pleasure.

Beth’s herbs better work, I prayed as Raymond came inside me once again.

We remained as we were for another moment, not saying a word. Then Raymond slipped out of me, set me down gently and let my skirts fall back to cover me. My legs wobbled underneath them.

“Go,” he rasped. “Mass will be over. You won’t want us to be seen together.” His breath was hot against my neck. Despite not being joined anymore, we were still standing close. “Say you were feeling unwell if anyone asks where you have been.”

I touched the corner of his mouth with my fingertip. “Consideration does not become you,” I teased breathlessly.

“I don’t particularly enjoy it.”

I smiled faintly and slipped from his embrace.    


	7. Embraces (slightly NSFW)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Language, sexual content, mentions of suicide 
> 
> Hope you enjoy, feedback is welcome!

It would be weeks, more likely months, before his father would be here from Carlow where he was currently stationed. That left Raymond with the choice of trying to leave for Rome before he got here, or wait and make the journey together – and therewith sharing the Vatican’s gratitude.

No, sharing really wasn’t his forte.

However, just as cut off Baron de Merville was from Waterford, so was Raymond stuck in Blackwater for the winter. His prickly sprite of a mistress certainly made the extended stay here entertaining, but Raymond had to think beyond that. The mission he had been sent here for was not to bed a heathen and spark her uneventful life with unwanted attentions.

“ _Pierre exécrable_!” That damned, blasted rock.  

Then there was, of course, Maeve. He despised her for making him desire her beyond all reason. She was just a distraction, a cunt to be fucked like any other. So he had thought initially. The wily heathen had taught him better.

Maeve’s wits matched her pride, and despite her being far from eager to share his bed, she had at least consented to cease fighting him. And she had been so warm and pliable under his hands the last time he had her, up against that tree. That delectably sharp tongue…

Yes, he had allowed Maeve to distract him. He had his orders, and if he had nothing to show for months of being in pagan territory other than a heathen woman in his bed, his father’s contempt would be the least of his worries.

Raymond’s idleness in rooting out the pagan tribes was in no small part due to Maeve, too. At first, he had wanted to see if she would ask him to spare her relatives. She hadn’t admitted to caring about her Gaelic relations, but had taken a more subtle route to stay his hand: Maeve had made him realise he could not care less about what the people in the forest chose to believe. As long as they did not interfere with his business, they could worship the devil himself and he wouldn’t care. Proselytization was best left to the monks.

Perhaps he should simply wait for the Baron de Merville to arrive with his soldiers and leave the bloody business to them. Let them have _that_ glory. He would settle for Rome’s gratitude for bringing them the rock.

_It isn’t that simple, though, is it?_ A small, nagging voice taunted him. _Leave the pagans to your father and you are effectively handing him Maeve on a silver platter, too_.   

That could never happen. Maeve was his, and not even his own father would take her from him.

For the first time, Raymond played with the idea of taking her with her to France. He could never marry her, even if she would ever consent to such a notion; but she would have a better life as his mistress in Rouen than she would ever have in this godforsaken village.

A ridiculous idea, certainly, but nonetheless one that stuck.

#

“Your sister… she is their commander’s mistress.” It was the first time Ella heard her sister be described that way. She had noticed a few weeks back that people had started to whisper about Maeve, often in relation to the foreigner. She had not had the courage to ask Maeve about it, nor about why Will Hawthorne had stopped calling on them.

“Yes!” Another girl pitched in. “She could talk to him, convince him to-“

“Convince him to what?”

The younger girls all turned, guiltily, at Maeve’s cool voice. Ella sagged with relief. Her older sister was a vision, with her long blonde curls, so different than the hair of other village girls. All shades of brown, black and red – but Maeve was the rare blonde. Nobody knew where she got it from, except for a select few who knew about Moira Goldfeather; her mother.

“Convince him to send supplies from Rome,” Christina spoke up after a pause. She thrust her chin forward defiantly. “Or to at least make some repairs in Blackwater. They surely have the manpower and the skill.” 

Maeve huffed. “Why would I have the power to convince Raymond de Merville to do either of those things?”

The other girl crossed her arms. “Oh, please. Don’t play coy, Maeve. We all know, the whole village knows, where you spend your nights. We know Merville has asked for you, and has easily received.”

Maeve wished she could get angry and feel insulted at those words, but she strangely did not care to that extent. What did silly, naïve Christina know of the world? Nothing. She would not last one night with Raymond.

“Weeks of spreading your legs for the wealthy French lord, and what have you got to show for it? Not one jewel around your neck, not one sack of grain for our families.”

Maeve arched an eyebrow. So this _child_ thought she was doing it for money? “And where exactly would a French lord, no matter how wealthy, get a sack of grain from when even we, who farm these lands, cannot find it?”

Christina was not to be put off. She was a flame-haired beauty with a penchant for luxury her sweethearts could not afford for long. “They have sources. Possibilities. If you’d make better use of your position-“

“And what position would that be, Christina?”

The other girl didn’t flinch, her brown eyes didn’t waver as she replied: “His whore. You are his whore, Maeve, and you haven’t used that position to your own, or at least to Blackwater’s, advantage in any way. If you had just let _me_ warm his bed, this would not have happened. I would have made us rich.” Christina knew exactly what kind of longings she would stir within the other girls, who would infect their families with it: the promise of a little less misery. If only proud Maeve Blackhawk could deign to ask for a favour. Winter’s harshness unsurfaced the worst of human nature; Blackwater despised Maeve for sharing a bed with de Merville, but they wanted her to gain something from it nonetheless.  

Maeve bent and picked up the water bucket. The temptation to pour it over Christina’s head was strong, but her indifference was even stronger. Were these the people she had sacrificed herself for? Raymond may be many things, but hypocritical was not one of them.

“Oh, by all means, you are welcome to him. If he will have you.” She would be grateful. To have her life back, nights alone in her bed, perhaps even salvage some of the respect she used to have in this town. She wasn’t pregnant, if the small trickle of blood this morning was anything to go by. It wasn’t too late to reclaim her life. 

#

The cold fury I had felt when Christina had so carelessly destroyed my efforts of keeping Ella away from this mess was short-lived. Perhaps it was even a relief to finally have it out in the open. I only hoped Ella would understand, that she could forgive.

“Come with me,” I said quietly and held out my hand to her. Feeling her thin-boned hand in mine, I wondered once again how we could even have the same father. We were so different.

Ella followed me without question. I led her into the forest, to the place we once tried to build a house in the trees – it had ended with scrapes and bruises, and the realisation we might have a softer residence on the ground. “What did Christina say to you about me?”

My younger sister was quiet for a moment. “She said you were the commander’s mistress.”

At least she hadn’t called me a whore from the outset.

“Is it true?”

I swallowed hard and nodded. “Yes. I should have told you, Ella. But I did not know how.”

“But… I thought you despised him!”

“I did. I mean, I do.” I leaned against a tree and faced my sister. Her eyes still looked at me with trust, as if she hadn’t grasped the whole extent of what I had done yet. Lying was an exhausting exercise, and it had sapped my strength for long enough. “I agreed to become Raymond de Merville’s mistress so that he would spare Blackwater. Spare _you_.”

“Oh, Maeve!” Ella flung her arms around my waist and hugged me tightly. “You shouldn’t have to do this, not for me. You have been protecting me all your life. I want to protect _you_ , too!”

I shook my head. “That is not your job!” I said fiercely. “It would have been Dad’s. Henry’s. Or Thomas’, for that matter. But not yours!”

Ella looked up at me and smiled sadly. “Don’t be so bossy, Maeve. I can choose whom I wish to protect myself.” She stood on her tiptoes and kissed my cheek. Ella rarely showed affection openly, so this was special. It assured me I was forgiven, that I was not judged by her for my actions. Now that Ella knew and still loved me, I wondered: Was what I had done and was doing really so horrible? If even my pure, innocent sister could forgive it? “We have to get you away from that man.”     

“He is not all bad,” I found myself saying.

Ella blinked in confusion. I didn’t blame her. Where on earth had this verdict come from? “I just mean,” I continued, “that you don’t have to worry about me. Raymond is not cruel to me.” At least, not anymore.

As I said it, I realised it was true.

#

“Maeve Blackhawk?”

What now, I wondered tiredly. If someone had offered me a horse in that moment, I would have taken it and ridden far away. To the edge of the world, where nobody would find me.

The soldier who had spoken was young, barely older than I was. Kind eyes in a handsome face. “He said I might find you here.” His French accent was strong, but not unpleasant. I had gotten used to its melody over the past weeks, even though Raymond’s accent was fading.

“Who did?” I asked stupidly.

The man blushed. “Sir Raymond de Merville. He is asking for you, my lady.”

“Of course he is,” I replied bitingly. I would have to tell him I was not a dog to be called to heel whenever it pleased him. “I don’t suppose he imagines I have my own life to lead.”

An embarrassed pause. “To be honest, my lady, I think he truly does not.”

Perhaps it was the absurdity of the situation, but I laughed. It seemed to make the soldier more at ease, and I noticed he had a nice smile. Perhaps not all of them were monsters.  

“You don’t have to call me that, you know,” I said as I followed him to the officers’ house. Briefly, I wondered what the owner of the pub thought about the continued imposition on his business.

“Call you what, my lady?”

I raised my eyebrows. “That. My lady. I sincerely doubt you are the one person in this town who is unaware of my actions that exclude me from ever being a lady.”

He did not miss a beat in replying. “In France, many ladies are mistresses and most mistresses are ladies. Some even _become_ ladies by first being a mistress. Being one does not exclude them from being the other.”

When they were nobly born, perhaps that was true. I wondered what Raymond might have to say on the matter. I smiled to myself, imagining his reaction if I asked him to make me his lady, not that he had made me his mistress. The absurdity of it.

Arriving at the house, the soldier opened the door and gave a little bow as he invited me to enter. _Home sweet home_ , I thought dryly as I grabbed a flagon of wine and climbed the stairs.

My father’s advice had been, as long as I can remember, to always know more than your enemy thinks you do. Always have one more blade than expected on your body; never admit to knowing something you might use later to your own advantage. I thought he had been paranoid – what evil could ever come to us in our remote village?

Now I was thanking him for his wisdom. For his foresight.

My instructions in French had not been extensive, nor consistent. The past weeks, however, had improved my understanding of it. I may still not be able to speak much, but I didn’t need to – like Beth, I just had to listen.

“…the pagans are no longer in that forest. We should cross it now, before they come back.”

“How do we know they’re gone?” Raymond.

“Our scouts found no trace of them, other than those blasted dead foxes. They seemed to have been there for a while. And there have been no attacks recently.”

A pondering silence. “Even so. We will wait for reinforcements.”

After several more minutes, I had heard enough. I knocked, bringing the wine. Hopefully I was only imagining the suspicion in Raymond’s eyes as he followed my every movement.

“Leave us,” he growled. Gladly, I thought and turned. “ _Not you_.”

I didn’t look up as I felt the general leave beside me, a brush of air on my arm. The door closed with a final-sounding click. “My lord?” They were just words. Raymond would never be my lord, but if those words made my life easier, I would utter them; but I would not hide the sarcasm they were spoken with.

“Read this,” he ordered and held out a piece of parchment to me, forcing me to turn and face him. I took the letter from him, playing for time to get my thoughts straight. “I can’t,” I said slowly, while my eyes darted over the words. Reinforcements were headed our way in no little numbers. If this was genuine…

Raymond arched an eyebrow. “No?”

“It is in French,” I added. Stupid, stupid, I cursed myself: Of course he knew I could read. “Or some language I do not know. I can read the letters, but I do not know the meaning.” That had been close. I would have to be more careful if I didn’t want to end up one head shorter than became me.

Fortunately, he was not able to hear my quickly beating heart. Taking the letter back from me, it seemed he was appeased. Perhaps he had suspected I had overheard his conversation and this had been a trick, a trap. I had just barely side-stepped it.

The peace I had just felt in the forest with Ella was gone. It had made me momentarily forget that Raymond was still a dangerous man, and he did not have my best interests at heart. “Is there anything else you require?”

He said nothing as he sipped his wine, regarded me with cool blue eyes. “No,” he eventually said. “Not for now.” 

Something was definitely up if he passed an opportunity to ravage me.

#

In retrospect, I should have seen it coming, _could_ have seen it coming. The altercation of the Gaels and the Normans. What did I _think_ Raymond’s men were doing in the forest, enjoying the scenery? Of course they had a mission, and now I knew what it had been: find the lairs of my mother’s people. 

I did not know what the losses had been on my grandfather’s side, or if it had even been his tribe Raymond’s men had found.

When the first soldiers returned, bloodied and battle-worn, and Raymond had not been among them, I felt an absurd mixture of hope and apprehension. Would I finally be free of him? If so, what would that mean for me? 

“What happened?” I asked the young soldier who had once escorted me to Raymond’s chamber with a delicate blush. By now I had discovered he was called Pierre and had a sweetheart back in France, one he hoped to live to return to.

His beardless face turned to me. “We were sent to kill a gathering of heathens, located just south of here.”

South. Not my grandfather then. I released a deep breath. “For what purpose?”

Pierre shifted uneasily before he haltingly replied: “The men get restless, being cooped up here for weeks. There is no Jerusalem to reclaim here, but…”

“…heathens to kill,” I finished. Too late, I realised I should have included protection of the Gaelic tribes in my price to be Raymond’s mistress. Perhaps I should add it to the list now; not that I really believed Raymond would consent – if he was even still alive.

Pierre nodded once, almost apologetic. I wondered what had made him choose a soldier’s life; he clearly didn’t have the heart for the necessary cruelty.  

The voice barking French commands across the camp sounded all too familiar. It seemed I wouldn’t be free of Raymond yet. I caught but a glimpse of him as he stormed through the rows of tents, and thought it best to leave the soldiers to their after-battle glory, if it deserved to be called that. It was hard to tell from the grim faces if they won or lost. I would be called sooner or later and find out. “I suppose I shall see you soon,” I muttered to Pierre and turned my back on the camp.

By the time dusk had come and gone, giving way to the blackness of night, I still had not been summoned. I would have enjoyed a calm, peaceful night to myself, if my curiosity had not won out eventually. “Damn it,” I cursed and pulled on my cloak.

The house was eerily silent, as if the fight with the Gaels had taken all the bawling behaviour out of the officers. Even the bar counter was unattended.

I didn’t bother knocking; we had passed that ritual of courtesy long ago.   

“Don’t recall requesting you,” he greeted me with a growl.

Charming as usual. “What happened?” I could not quite keep shock from entering my voice as I looked at him. Shirt in tatters, plastered to his torso with blood.

“You almost got your life back. Almost,” he sneered bitterly. Pouring himself a large goblet of wine, he groaned as the movement stirred the wound in his shoulder. “Then again, your wish might still be fulfilled.”

I didn’t feel like exchanging barbs, for once. “Did you have someone look at that?” Knowing full well he hadn’t, or he wouldn’t be in this state. “Of course not. And you’re calling _me_ stubborn.” Resolutely, I grabbed a bowl and went to the fire, pushing a cauldron filled with water over it. Healing was one of the few skills I had, and one that ran in my veins naturally. Even against my better judgment.

“Sit down,” I ordered. If I didn’t clean the wound, it would probably fester, and Raymond might be dead within a week. In other words, I would curse myself for my actions the next morning, but despite everything he had done to me, this was not how I would make him pay for it. If and when his day of reckoning came, it would be by _my_ hands alone. 

After a heartbeat, he did as I told him to. “Why did they not make you head of Blackwater instead of your witless uncle? You’ve got the authoritative attitude for it.”

I rolled my eyes. He was clearly getting delirious or drunk or both. “You may have noticed I am a woman. We don’t inherit, we don’t get a say, let alone are we given leadership.” I ladled some hot water into the bowl and sat down on the bed, next to him. The blood was flowing from his right shoulder. That was good, insofar as that it lessened the chances of having harmed any vital organs.

Carefully, I started to cut away the shirt from his body. His muscles were glistening with blood and sweat. At least the wound did not look infected yet. My fingertips traced his collarbone. After all this time, his body, his closeness, felt familiar. Comforting, almost, now that my social world had shrunk to only my closest family and him. Friends averted me, neighbours spited me. 

This realisation brought gentleness to my touch.

#

“Your touch…”

“What?” she asked curtly. It was clear she did not wish to elaborate on what her touch might do to him.

“It is different.”

Maeve paused, briefly. “To whose?” When he didn’t answer immediately, she continued cutting away his shirt from the bleeding wound. It looked worse than it was, appeared more painful.

“Madeleine’s,” he answered without knowing why. She had been dead and buried for almost fifteen years now.

To his surprise, Maeve’s voice was soft when she asked: “Who is she?” 

“My wife.”

Maeve halted. He could tell that she had not expected this response; though she must have wondered at one point whether he had a wife at home, in France. He was closer to forty than thirty, it stood to reason he had a family. He could have had grandkids, even. “You never mentioned her.”

“When would I have? When I undress you, or when you stare at me hatefully over dinner?”

Her ministrations continued, if more slowly than before. “Point taken,” she replied meekly. “So where is she?”

“Dead. These past fifteen years.”

Maeve’s hand slipped from his shoulder, and he craved their warmth, their soothing softness. He wanted to undress her and pull her young, warm body into his bed, to feel her breath against his as he made love to her.  

“She found out she was pregnant, and it led her to the edge of a cliff.”

He could hear Maeve breathe in sharply, swallow hard. Then she continued tending to the gash in his shoulder. It would leave another scar amongst many. “How do you know that was the reason?” Maeve asked softly. Her movements were gentle yet pragmatic as she cleaned his wound. She never flinched from the sight of blood. “People are complex, Raymond,” she continued when she noticed his confused frown. “There usually is more than one thing that drives them.” Maeve dipped the bloodied cloth into the bowl of hot water and repeated her motions.

“You are saying it was not only her pregnancy with my child that drove her to that cliff, but her marriage to me as well?”

Maeve rolled her eyes. “Men. It’s always about you, isn’t it?” Her touch was definitely firmer when she dabbed now, and he didn’t think it was an accident. “It is just so hard for you to believe that we women have other interests than you, that we had lives before we became the wife of someone. You just feel entitled to everything we have, everything we feel. Let me enlighten you: You are not. Women make the best of the meagre scraps we have; legally, socially. That doesn’t entitle men like you to any emotions of ours. We feel what we feel, we think what we think, and there isn’t anything you our any god can do about it.” Maeve sat up and inspected the wound. Her words were quiet when she added: “You can violate our bodies, but our hearts and minds will never be yours.”

Raymond wanted to take her then and there just to make a point; then he realised he didn’t know what that point would be. Maeve hadn’t broken, hadn’t yielded, in all those nights he had forced her into his bed. Perhaps pain made him lenient, perhaps the years of unresolved wondering took their toll; either way, he admitted to curiosity. Admitted she may know more than he. “What would it take, to call your heart and mind ours, then?”

Maeve blinked in surprise. “Well,” she started to hide her confusion at the change of tone. “Our mind never will belong to anyone but us. As for our hearts…Being asked for our opinion certainly helps. Being valued for more than just what’s between our legs.”

He let that sink in. “I would like to point out that I do value your pretty breasts, as well.”

Maeve tied the bandage tightly and with force, extracting a groan from him. “Pity that men have neither breasts nor quims to value. It might make their existence infinitely more useful.”

Watching Maeve bend over the fire, putting more logs onto it as she cleaned the bandages in hot water, Raymond realised his worry had been unfounded. Maeve did not pity him, nor was she smugly pleased at his pain. She was not even reproaching him for setting out to murder her mother’s family; not yet, at least. “The sharpness of your wit is decidedly more pleasurable than your relatives’ blades’.”

“If only their aim were as true.”

#

Blood loss seemed to dull Raymond’s belligerence, or perhaps that was due to the wine. Either way, he did not snap at me for my barbed retorts. I cleaned up the remnants of my healing efforts and turned to leave.

“Stay,” he whispered hoarsely. Pressing my hand against his chest. I didn’t want to see it, didn’t want to think him capable of it, but I almost believed I could see pain in his eyes. Not the physical kind.

_Don’t start feeling sympathy for this man_ , I scolded myself. But could I really ignore that he may be a bit more complex than I had originally thought? Furthermore, this sounded as if he were giving me a choice. The chance to walk away, to choose not to spend the night with him.

I pulled my hand from his grasp. The brief moment of hurt and grim acceptance wasn’t lost on me; neither was the cautious expectancy when I did not leave the room, but rather poured two goblets of wine.

“Did you not know before, that your wife was pregnant?” I tried to take the sting out of my words by making my voice as soft as it could be.    

“No. Her nursemaid told me afterwards. I had been away, in Rome, for months.” He doubted it would have made a difference, I could see it in the offhand manner he answered with. “I had only been home for two days when she was gone, and wasn’t found until a fisherman pulled her from the sea.”

What a horrid sight that must have been. I did not know if he had loved her, but either way that experience must have left a mark. Yes, I admit I felt sympathy. “I’m sorry. “ Was it enough to justify his manner towards women in general and me in particular? Of course not. But it made it less convenient to paint him as the outright villain. “How long were you in Rome for?”

“Four, five months… too long, apparently.”

I said nothing. French standards would never deem me noble, and in regards to my carnal, physical knowledge they would be right. A French noblewoman might never have paused, never doubted.

“You’re uncharacteristically silent.”

I blinked, shook my head. Hoped sipping my wine would deter him long enough to change the line of inquiry. It was not enough. Raymond read me like an open book. “What,” he demanded.

“Nothing. It’s just…” The wine was of good quality, it always was, in Raymond’s chambers. It burned my throat pleasantly as I gulped its dryness too quickly. “Will you promise me not to judge me for what I will say in answer to your question?” I was rephrasing his demand kindly, for it definitely had not been a question. A question left a choice.

“Very well. Now, what?”

Pain clearly made him no more gentle. “You said you did not know she was pregnant,” I started. “And that you were away for five months.” Why had I opened my stupid mouth, why…? “A pregnancy starts to show at three to four months the latest, Raymond.” When had it become my task to tell Raymond de Merville that his wife had betrayed him? I had asked for none of this. “Depending on…various factors, a woman may know within two months if she expects a child or not, but she would not be able to hide it for longer than four.”

The ensuing silence choked me.

“The child wasn’t mine.”

“I didn’t say that. I just-“

Raymond chuckled, and it wasn’t a pleasant sound. “Fifteen years, and nobody had the gall to tell me. It takes a pagan farmer girl like you to present the truth…” This clearly wasn’t the moment to tell him that he could have worked this out himself if he had bothered to. Men. So caught in the sense of their own importance they never bothered with how women felt, how they lived, breathed. How their bodies worked, how they craved pleasure as much as they did. I almost felt for his dead wife, perhaps I even envied her, for she had had the courage to defy him. 

“Raymond…” I rarely spoke his name, worried of the intimacy it might invoke. But now, I had become dependent upon him, whether I liked it or not. Offending him as well as my townspeople was not an option. “I only said what was on my mind. I might be wrong. Keep Madeleine in the memory you have-”

“I did not love her,” he said suddenly, forcefully. “It was a marriage of convenience. We were agreeable to each other, that was good enough.”

_Apparently not_ , I thought to myself. I could not condemn Madeleine, though I had never met her. She had been caught in the tight-roped net that men knit for us women. More so for her than for me, even; by comparison, I got off easy. Living in a remote village in Ireland held privileges for women; more independence, more leeway to shape our own lives. We had no nobility, at least not in the way other countries seemed to think of it. Us women had more freedom; at least, we would have had had we not shackled ourselves to being a foreign, French lord’s whore.  

“I drove her to that cliff…”

I did not expect that, I will admit. It was my excuse for comforting him that night; that he had shown feeling, the capacity to reflect his own wrongs. “No,” I protested softly. “What drove her to that cliff are the ancient rules, set by men, made for women. Rules we are not allowed to change, rules we suffer from and that men benefit from. I do not know what kind of husband you were to Madeleine, nor what kind of wife she was to you. But if you did not love and respect each other, this was bound to happen. And yes, you would have had the power to change it – _she_ did not. Because she was a woman, she was utterly at your mercy.” I did not blame her for taking a lover, for preferring the cold embrace of the sea rather than present her husband with a child that was not his.   

Either the wine was showing effect, or the pain of his wound, or the reminiscence of the past; but Raymond did not react with the fury I had expected, nor the cold disdain he was a master of. “What would you have done? You are clearly not bound to the same rules.”

“Well, I wouldn’t have married you in the first place,” I muttered before I could think better of it.

To my surprise, he smiled. “No, you wouldn’t have.” His smile could be kind, softening the harshness of his scar. It was a pity he didn’t want it to be so. “You would have sent me straight back to hell.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” I acquiesced. “Purgatory would have been sufficient.”

He cupped my face in his hand, turning me towards him. Those eyes… how could ice burn so hotly? I didn’t protest when he kissed me. Perhaps a part of me even enjoyed it, the feel of his beard against my tender skin, his lips parting mine and tongue against tongue. His body radiated warmth, and his kiss promised comfort, company. “Stay,” he asked again. Differently this time, his voice rough with desire.

I was under no illusion I could have walked away; strangely, I didn’t want to. “You’re hurt.”

“That should satisfy you,” he murmured against my collarbone.

Though I did not contradict him, I knew it wasn’t true. Raymond in pain brought me no satisfaction, and neither did knowing that bedding me would cause him more physical pain. My glaring hatred for him had dimmed, had lost some of its bite, at least for tonight. 

“Ask whatever you will of me,” he murmured against my neck. His voice was pleading, almost. If this weren’t Raymond de Merville, I might have believed he was begging. “Just give me the illusion, this once, that you like this.”

I sighed. Who was I fooling? If I ignored what this man had done to me and my family, I _did_ like it; or at least, I didn’t find it horrible. My fingers untied my stays, I let the skirts drop to the floor. Naked as I was, I climbed into bed, slipped one leg over his hips and straddled him. If there was ever to be a night in which I was in charge, it would be tonight. I intended to make use of it.

Not only did I allow his kisses, but I reciprocated them with equal fervour.     

When I lowered myself onto him, I moaned. Arched my back, pushed my hips towards his. It wasn’t all faked; and even though I did not feel the peak of pleasure he did, there was a pleasant pressure in my core.

Loneliness makes you find strange bedfellows. 

 


	8. Green Fires and White Nights

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise for the long, unplanned hiatus! 
> 
> Warnings: Language, sexual content, adult themes (not disclosed further because of potential spoilers - for details please see the end of the chapter!)

I walked by the stables that morning. They had lain abandoned for years, with only one to three horses residing there. We did not have need for more, nor the means to feed them. Now the boxes were full with noble destriers.

There was nobody around, so I snuck in. I had not realised I missed the smell of straw and hay until it tickled my nose again. I suppressed the urge to sneeze. One of the steeds caught my attention, simply for being black as the night. My life was surrounded by black: Blackwater, Blackhawk, mourning black. All so dark. I yearned for the sun and the colours of spring flowers.

“Aren’t you a beauty,” I murmured and let my hand wander over his soft, yet resilient fur. He was well-groomed, even cherished perhaps, by his rider. The horse rested his head on my shoulder as I stroked him, making me chuckle. Animals had it easy, apparently, to trust.

“You could have your own.”

I flinched back. I had not heard Raymond come in. “What would I do with a horse?” I mumbled. Flee and be free.  

“Ride him.”

I tensed. Was it the accent that made everything Raymond said sound…sultry? Or was it just him? 

“For pleasure.”

Just him, I gathered. “I could not afford that pleasure.” He could take that any way he wished; I would no longer accommodate him simply because he held all the power.

Raymond stepped next to me, absent-mindedly running his hand along the horse’s neck as he looked at me. “Why do you wish to always be at war with me, Maeve?” How soft his voice could be, almost giving the illusion of the man it belonged to being capable of emotions.

_Because I have decided to be, and I can never forgive you if I am to live with myself_.

“You have hardly presented me with a choice in the matter,” I muttered. “Had you given me time, Raymond, I might have come to you willingly if you’d asked. Instead, you commanded, you threatened, you took what you wanted regardless of what it might do to others. You can hardly expect me to ever sanction that by willingly embracing the man who has taken everything from me. My friends and neighbours, people I have known all my life, avoid me now. They go to admirable lengths to not encounter me, to not be seen with me. It might not seem drastic to you, but you did not grow up in a town like Blackwater. You made me a whore, Raymond. An opportunistic whore who will lay with the enemy to spare herself. Even when you leave, that tag will cling to me like the hangman’s rope.” In time, it might just form the noose to kill me. It was a small step from being called a whore to being called a witch.

“Pretty words,” he said after a long moment. “Easy to say now you would have come to me willingly. You may never have. I desired you then, Maeve, as I desire you now.”

Hardly – excuse the pun – a surprise.

“And I am not a patient man.”

As if that made it decent, or be any form of an excuse. “Well, you got what you wanted, when you wanted it. Just don’t complain of my attitude towards it.” I gave the horse a final pat.

#

Raymond watched her go, and wished briefly to be better with words. To be less proud. Admit that he now wished he had given her that time she might have needed; that he had regrets. If he could, he would take back his ultimatum. Her body in return for the peace of the village; it seemed hardly worth it now. Blackwater meant nothing to him, he could have spared it anyway and seduced Maeve by honest means.

But Maeve’s body had been all he had been able to think about. Her blazing green eyes, her proud step, the way her chin lifted when she had faced him, protecting her sister. It irked him, angered him even, that this heathen peasant girl seemed more sure of herself and her place in this world than he, future Lord of Merville, rich, entitled, had ever felt. He desired that woman, and at the same time he had wanted to break her.

He had been wrong. A broken Maeve was no Maeve. Fortunately, she hadn’t yielded under his yoke; unfortunately, it had only driven her to never be at peace with him. 

#

It seemed that the blood last month had not been enough, and that I had not miscounted. Nor was the food disagreeable to me. I had chosen to ignore the signs, but now I had to face the reality, and it was an ugly one. Raymond had gotten me with child.

Any kinder feeling I might have started to develop for him was smothered by this knowledge, replaced by the familiar burning rage. Who did he think he was, to determine my life like this? I wouldn’t have it. 

My decision was easily made.

“This might kill you,” the Wise Woman said after I had explained my predicament in a few short sentences. Any extra word might tip me over the edge.  

“I don’t care,” I replied numbly. “If this child is allowed to live, I am dead anyway.” Short of asking someone to beat the child out of me, this was my only chance – and I might still resort to that solution if the potion didn’t work.

Beth looked at me with steely eyes. “Be it on your head, Maeve. I cannot give guarantees.”

“No indeed, for if your herbs had worked in the first place, I wouldn’t even be in this position!” The mingling of panic and helplessness did not make a kind person.

I was a fallen woman, a girl who had whored herself for the whole town to see. Once I was respected, yes; my father, gone to fight in the Holy Land. He had been well-liked all around, efficient, fair, kind; had allowed everyone to follow their faith. Everyone, including my mother. There had been peace between our folk and the native tribes, then. Peace that had been ripped up and shredded to pieces by men like Raymond.

Beth wasn’t impressed by my outburst. Instead, she pushed her hand to my womb, then my breasts, pressing the sensitive tissue. I yelped. “Perhaps if you had come to me _before_ you first went to lie with him, my herbs would have worked,” she replied evenly. Almost amused. “By the feel of it, that babe has been growing inside you for three months, perhaps a little more.”

“But the blood-“

“A small trickle?” Beth huffed. “Most likely that was your little one telling you to just where to shove those herbs. By the time you came to me, you were already pregnant, Maeve.”

No, no, no… I forced back a sob. Tears would be of no help to me. “It is _not_ my little one. I want it _gone_ , Beth.” 

She arched an eyebrow. As always it was hard to tell what she was thinking. “You’d have better chances of surviving the birth than the abortion.”

I gritted my teeth and tried to calm my shaking hands. They itched to take a blade to my womb and end it immediately. “ _I do not care_. I will not carry the result of this man’s desires.” Any kinder feelings I may have once held for Raymond had evaporated into nothing. His attentions I had learnt to bear, but his child? Never.

“No, you will rather die for your own pride. Did you ever think that perhaps that Norman of yours would leave you alone if you’re pregnant? Men usually flee once they are confronted with the fruit of their lust.”

I laughed bitterly. And give Raymond the satisfaction of having won this battle over my body after all? To have him look at my growing belly with a smug smile, pleased he had left behind evidence of my shame? No. He would have to look elsewhere for his breed mare.

With another sigh, Beth handed me a small vial. “I hope you live to regret it, Maeve. At least it would mean you _would_ live.”

Easy for her to say. She hadn’t had one of those French invaders violate her body, forced a child into her womb. Nonetheless I nodded my thanks and left. I did not believe in God, and was starting to doubt my own gods; but you did not mock or disrespect the Wise Woman.

I thought to go back to the village, at first; to embrace my sister once more in case I did die of this. But I would have lost my courage, so I did not, with a heavy heart. The wine I had taken with me helped, it made everything seem easier, gave me courage where I might have otherwise failed. The spot I had picked was one far off the main road, one that couldn’t be found unless you knew where to look.

The potion was bitter, the snow beneath my fingers soft and fluffy, the sky spinning. _Just make it go away_ … 

#

He gave them no warning of his intrusion, no chance to hide Maeve. Raymond had waited long enough for her to return from whatever business usually drove her into the forest. Maeve had left before first light, according to his spies, and it was now almost dusk. Either she had returned to the village by a path unknown to him and refused his summons, or she had finally fled and left Blackwater to its fate.

_No,_ something told him. Maeve would not leave without her sister.  

“Where is she?!” he thundered as he marched into the small sitting room of the Blackhawks. Maeve wasn’t here, but her sister was.

Maeve hadn’t fled, yet she wasn’t in Blackwater either. What kept her in the forest a whole day?

Ella folded in on herself as the Norman entered. Her sister was facing this overbearing, intimidating man on her own, to protect her. To protect them all. How did she do it? That scarred face alone scared Ella. She did not dare imagine what cruel soul lay beneath.

Thomas tried to stand up proudly, and failed. He was no match for Raymond de Merville, never had been. Maeve should have been head of this town, she should have led the negotiations all along. The younger Blackhawk brother shook his head. “I do not know, my lord. Maeve goes where she wills…”

Raymond wondered if one day he would cave in and kill this fool. If he hadn’t promised Maeve to keep her family from harm, he might already have done so. “When did you last see her?”

Ella noticed that she hated the way Thomas shrugged, holding out his hands as if there was nothing he could do. _You could have done so much_ , she thought. _If you didn’t flinch from your own shadow_. Had she been born with the privileges of being a man, she would not have wasted them. But then again, maybe she would have. Bravery was not her forte; people in general made her uncomfortable.

Maeve was braver than she was, and even she had been forced to yield to this intimidating stranger in the end. Maybe it was just the way of the world that women had to yield… _No_ , Maeve’s voice whispered in her head. _Men only have the power over us that we give them_.

“Why do you ask?” Ella couldn’t believe she had dared to speak. Briefly, when those cold blue eyes turned on her, she regretted ever opening her mouth.

Raymond considered the young girl. This was the sister Maeve would burn down worlds for, even her own. Ella was pretty, even beautiful, in the fragile way a shy doe is graceful next to the sharp, predatory wolf. Maeve was the wolf to Ella’s doe.

Yet the doe might know where the she-wolf was hiding. “I could say I am concerned, but you wouldn’t believe that, would you?” It was the truth, though. Even for a wild spirit such as Maeve, the forest held dangers.

Ella shook her head. She wouldn’t, indeed, no matter how convincing that deep voice sounded. Yet, when she dared to look into Raymond de Merville’s eyes, she thought to detect a hint of what she would call feeling. Worry, perhaps. If Ella was honest, she herself had not liked the look of her sister when she had headed off that morning. Maeve had been distracted, unfocused, haunting the house like a restless ghost. “She went to the woods,” Ella said quietly. “This morning. Before daybreak.”

That did not seem to surprise him. “Why?”

“To visit a friend.”

“What direction did she head off to?”

Ella hesitated. Considered lying. What business did this man have to run down her sister like an animal? “I do not know,” she replied truthfully. “But she often takes the north road when she makes those visits, and turns left off of it, after about a mile.”

Raymond nodded sharply. Ella didn’t know it, but it was a symbol of gratitude, coming from him.

As he saddled his horse, he realised how foolish he was being. He had duties here, tasks waiting for him, and he was chasing after a girl like a lusty youth. It did not stop him from riding into the growing darkness underneath the trees. A gut feeling, that was all he had to go on. The way Maeve had flinched from his touch more than usual when he had caressed her hips, her belly last night. How her gaze had returned to its spiteful green fire, rather than reveal the softened gaze in her eyes he had noticed lately.    

One advantage of the endless snow was the leaving of tracks. The white stillness of the woods yet made it difficult to see, despite reflecting enough of the moon’s light for Raymond to find his way. It took him hours to find Maeve, motionless, lips turned blue.

 

 

 

**Spoiler warning of adult themes:** Abortion 


	9. Bleak Midwinter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the amazing, encouraging feedback! It means a lot to me, and that's not just a phrase. ;) 
> 
> I apologise for this being a bit of a slow chapter, it will pick up pace again in the next. 
> 
> The only warnings this time are a bit of language and references to sexual or abusive themes.

“Maeve!” The cold clutching his heart had nothing to do with the temperature around him, nor with the one residing in his soul. He knelt down beside her still form, tearing off his gloves as he did to feel for a pulse on her throat. Fingertips detecting nothing, he pulled her closer to his body. “Maeve!”

A flutter of a breath. “Go away…”

“What did you do?” he shouted, shaking her angrily while trying to reign in his temper. Maeve was pale, so pale. Her body limp in his arms, offering no resistance.

“Just…go away.”

It was then that he saw the empty vial beside her. A friend in the woods, Ella had said. Raymond cursed colourfully in French. A Wise Woman. “Oh, you stupid girl,” he cursed and shifted her around in his arms. If anything, his time in armies had taught him how to make people vomit their guts up.

He didn’t know if it had been enough to get the poison out of her system, or how much of it she had already ingested. “What did you do?” he asked mechanically as he picked Maeve up and walked towards his horse. There was no need to ask. Only one thing could make his proud heathen risk her life like this.

Raymond needed to hear her voice, though, needed to provoke an answer.

“No,” Maeve protested. “Make it…go away.” Feebly, she tried to get out of his grasp.

Raymond checked her skirts for blood, but there wasn’t any. Hopefully he had rid her body of the poison on time. He wrapped her in his warm cloak and put her on the horse in front of him, praying to the God he had lost faith in that he would not cause another woman’s death; would not cause Maeve’s death.

_She deserves better_.

#

My head was a ball of agony. The upside was that it blotted out the pain in my limbs. What had happened?

I turned around, inhaling a familiar scent that yet was not my own. Nor were the pillows on which I rested. Memories returned to me then, one by one: Trees spinning, everything floating around me as the cold crept in. A firm grip holding me, a deep voice against my ear, strong arms carrying me into the warmth… I was suddenly wide awake.

“What were you doing?” Raymond greeted me. He looked as if he hadn’t slept and sounded angrier than usual, but his voice was no louder for it.    

I cursed myself for sitting up too quickly. Whatever potion I had taken, it had done my body no favours. “None of your-“

He sat down on the edge of the bed and took my chin firmly between his thumb and fingers. “You went to a Wise Woman and almost got yourself killed. You would be dead if I hadn’t found you.”

I was too weak to struggle against his hold, but my mind was sharp enough. “Perhaps I would prefer being dead. I didn’t ask to be found.” He let go of me abruptly, fury in his eyes.

Raymond paced the room, and I wouldn’t have been surprised had he killed me. He looked livid enough for it. I wondered why. I would just be another body for him to bury. “Just weeks ago, you condemned Madeleine for ending her life to end her child’s.” So he knew. That certainly worsened my chances of getting away and trying again.

“Hardly comparable,” I growled. I didn’t bother correcting him that I was not the one who had condemned her; I understood why she had done what she had. “She was your wife, and she didn’t want to present you with a bastard child – whereas I am in no way attached to you legally, and I just don’t want to have _your_ child.” I wouldn’t even blink if faced with the choice of giving birth to a child that was not my husband’s; not if that husband were Raymond. I would do it.

I might even come to live with the shame of having a bastard child here in Blackwater, if the father were one of the village men, or a tribesman. But to live in this town, and be mother to Raymond de Merville’s bastard child….no.

“You are keeping this child,” he announced. 

“Even you cannot force me to,” I said with all the strength I could muster. All my pain had been for nothing: I was still pregnant. Still had half a monster inside me, clawing its way through my body, day by day. “Force some other woman to carry your bastard. Or, if you want an heir so badly, go back to France and marry a noblewoman. I bet they are waiting in line to be your breed mare.” I turned onto my side, feeling so, so tired. “I will not be the mother of your child, Raymond de Merville. If it costs me my life, it is a price I am willing to pay. Maybe then this nightmare will finally end…”

If he replied, I didn’t hear it. I was asleep.

#

As if Maeve almost dying wasn’t bad enough, his father was on his way now that the northern road had been cleared. Raymond pushed the thought out of his head as well as possible, and concentrated on keeping Maeve alive and their child unharmed. It did not come as a surprise to him that this turned out to be a day- and night-filling occupation, and did nothing to endear him to Maeve.

Baron de Merville arrived when Maeve’s pregnancy was already showing clearly. It did not take the Baron long to discover what, or rather who, his son had been up to these past winter months. It took him even less time to confront Raymond with it.  

“Maeve Blackhawk,” the older man announced slowly.

Raymond gritted his teeth. He had abstained from seeing her for two weeks, in the hopes of keeping his father off her trail. Futilely, it seemed. “What of her?”

“Do not play games with me, son. I know she is your whore.”

“Maeve is not a whore,” Raymond snapped, cursing himself the next instant. He had started to let down his emotional guard recently – and Maeve had played into that weakness. Wearing it down further, piece by piece, with every sharp word.   

“I do not care what she is. I care about what she is _not_ , and that is a proper Christian. Cease your… _relations_ with her.”

Raymond shook his head. Had his father always seemed so old and stern?

“I won’t.” It was too late now. Not only was Maeve carrying his child, but also could Raymond not stop thinking about her soft curves beneath him, how her breath hitched when he entered her. How much pleasure it brought him to tame her, if only for a night. The sparkle in her eyes when they whetted their wits against each other’s. Amusement when he tried to explain the Christian faith to her and failed to convince her. There had been tenderness, too; her hands healing his wound, her kisses soothing the aching emptiness in his heart. Those moments were long gone now, but he wouldn’t abandon the hope of them returning.    

Baron de Merville laughed derisively. “Oh, do not tell me you have developed feelings for her. She is a whore, a pagan whore. Nothing more.”

Because I have made her so, Raymond realised. Even that had not broken her; Maeve was prouder, stronger than that. He could have her any which way, force her to obey him, but she never yielded. More than that: she defied him. “No. She _is_ more. Maeve is the mother of my child.”

His father huffed derisively.  “At least we know now that you’re still capable of siring an heir. That woman’s bastard, however, will not inherit the de Merville lands and titles. Pay her for the child’s upkeep if you are so inclined, and leave her. Sire a legal heir, on a mother of noble blood.” How easily he dismissed his grandchild, just because its mother wasn’t up to his standards.

Raymond wondered who of them both he would enrage more by stating that his father and Maeve agreed on that at least; this child was not wanted by either. It seemed only Raymond wanted to see this baby born, to see it thrive, grow up.

And he would. This was his child.

“No.”

The older de Merville rolled his eyes and threw up his hands. “Keep her as your mistress then, if she is so enticing in bed. Just be sure to sire a legitimate heir, and a spare, on your wife. I have told you before: Go back to France, wed a noblewoman. Maybe that will end your unhealthy obsession with this blasted island. You have been here too long.”

Raymond couldn’t disagree with that statement alone. Always being away from home, fighting other men’s crusades, had made him hard and cruel. More so than even his upbringing had. “It was you who brought me here in the first place, who gave me this mission!” Raymond took a deep breath, trying to cool his temper. “As it stands now,” he continued in an attempt to bring reason into an emotionally charged discussion, “your line ends with me. I might die any day in battle, or on my way back to France. Maeve is carrying my child, there is no doubt about it.” Unlike in Madeleine’s case. Had his father known, Raymond wondered, of Madeleine’s infidelity? Would he have cared, if he _had_ known?

The baron laughed mirthlessly. “You are not seriously suggesting making her your _wife_?” 

Raymond said nothing. His temper had reached the boiling point where he might say things he could never take back. The baron was his father, yes, but he had ceased respecting him accordingly years ago; around the same time he had become sceptical towards his own faith. A scepticism only Maeve understood, shared. Encouraged, even. Sometimes Raymond wondered as to her motives. Had she been any other woman, he would have accused her of opportunism, heresy, whatever suited him. Maeve, however, was so utterly at peace with what and who she was, he couldn’t fault her for it. She was Maeve. No more, no less. What she said was what she thought, what she didn’t say was what she thought it wise to hold back. His beloved heathen woman.

“While I am sure that this is what this girl wants, I will not allow it,” his father said now and brought him back to the present.

Maeve agreeing to his marriage proposal was all he desired, at this point. Without success. “On the contrary, father, I doubt she would have me.”

Mathieu nodded once, almost in mock salute to the woman he so easily degraded without ever having met her. “We should be grateful for that, then. Go back to France after this mission is over, Raymond, and get a wife. A noble, respectable wife who will bear you legitimate heirs to carry on your name, inherit your lands and titles.”

There had been a time when that was all he had wanted. Madeleine could have been that woman. They would have had a few children, and when both of them had grown old, they would have had nothing to say to each other. Maeve challenged him, made him question things he had always considered given. He entertained no illusions she loved him, but her smart, wild nature put her at risk here, anywhere. This world did not like proud, intelligent women with a sharp wit. One who was neither Pagan nor Christian, who could claim sanctuary with neither faith.

He wanted, desired, loved that woman; he would keep her safe from a world that was too small-minded for her.   

“I hear that little whore of yours comes from a family of daughters. Most likely the child she carries will be a girl. Useful enough for alliances, but not worth shackling yourself to a meaningless Gaelic woman for.”

Meaningless. Raymond bristled, but said nothing. His father would never understand. Maeve was all he wanted. “Is that what you sent Claudette away for? An alliance?” He shouldn’t have brought up his long-since dead sister. But there was barely a day when she wasn’t in his thoughts. He had loved her, and she had been sacrificed for politics. 

Maeve should not suffer the same fate.

#

Stairs. How often had I stood here, considering it. Again I paused, wondering. Could I do it? I might just break my neck, or twist an ankle. But if there was just a slim chance…

I yelped when a hand closed firmly around my wrist. “Don’t.”

“You have no say in this,” I spat once I recovered from the shock of his uncanny ability to appear out of nowhere in the most inopportune moments. Since his father had arrived, his vigilance had slipped a little, but I didn’t doubt he had found somebody to keep a constant eye on me.

I had not seen Baron de Merville aside from glances from afar. He had not struck me as imposing a figure as his son, but appearances can be deceiving. It might be the smallest soldier who would put a knife between your ribs.  

Raymond’s blue eyes blazed. “I am the child’s _father_!” 

I laughed mirthlessly. “Don’t make it sound like anything to be proud of. It doesn’t take a great man to sire a child. And I certainly didn’t ask _you_ to be my child’s father – I didn’t ask for a child in the first place.”

“Yes, you have made that abundantly clear,” he replied dryly. “I don’t blame you for it, Maeve. If I had a choice I would have waited for you to be my wife before getting you with child.”

I freed my arm from his grip. “Yet another thing I’m not asking for.”

“But I am asking you. Marry me.” There was no sign of amusement or deceit in his eyes. Raymond was not joking.  

If it weren’t such a bleak prospect I might have laughed. “No. I will never belong to you, Raymond; just as my womb doesn’t belong to you.”

#

She was right, of course – it made his anger boil all the hotter for it. Her womb didn’t belong to him; it never would. Unless he made that pagan hoyden his wife. She would be his, then, completely and utterly. There would be no escape for her any longer. 

Which was why she would never even consider it. Maeve would prefer a life in shame, with a bastard child, to a life as his wife. In this, she was stronger than Madeleine had been.

Would he have even noticed, if Madeleine’s child had come ‘late’? Or ‘early’, depending on how Madeleine would have spun the story? He was sorry to admit he probably would not have. At least Maeve had been consequential. She had said she wanted nothing of his, and she had gone to take the logical steps to ensure it. She did not want his child in her womb, so she was willing to wreck her own body to expel it. 

“I thought I could make my peace with you,” she said now. “But you forcing me to carry your child…” she laughed mirthlessly. “I hope you believe in God. For it would force you to believe in hell, and I want you to burn in it.”

Initially, he wanted to close his hand around her neck, push her against the nearest wall and force her into submission. But then he realised: it had not worked for weeks. Why should it now? Maeve was not to be subdued. He no longer wished to hurt her, break her.   

Maeve smiled cruelly when she realised he had lost all power over her. If only he could make her see that he cared, that he wanted what she tentatively promised him…a family.

“Do not expect your heathen gods to be more merciful,” he growled. She should not have this strong of a hold on him, much less make him feel like the begging party - Maeve was an unmarried, pregnant woman, he was future baron over vast lands in France.

“My gods do not judge,” Maeve said smugly. “I could carve this child from my womb and they would not close their heaven to me. I still might do that,” she added almost as an afterthought.

She yelped when he took her shoulders roughly, barely resisting the urge to shake this folly out of her. He wished he had the words to express what he felt; that he wanted her to keep this baby, to bear his child. That she would marry him, come away with him. That he wanted her untamed, wild nature.

Those blazing forest-green eyes told him she would never agree to either of his desires willingly. She was pregnant because he had raped her. This child would only be born if he could stop her from slitting open her own belly. There was no mercy or forgiveness to be expected from Maeve. In this moment, he hated his father. Hated him for the type of man he had made of Raymond.

“Don’t,” he said. Implored. This baby was his. The woman who carried it…was his.

Maeve chuckled mirthlessly. “What do you care? You won’t be here to take care of this child. You want to humiliate me, to be assured of your own virility in impregnating your whore. I don’t want that, and I will not stand for it. Go back to Rome, or France, or hell. I don’t care, Raymond. Just go.”

He released her wordlessly. Maeve had absolutely nothing but a ruined reputation. Yet she still preferred that to him. It should have insulted him. But over the past few weeks with Maeve, he had learnt that his status, his money, his title, none of them mattered here, not to her.

“You’re going to be gone forever in a few days, weeks. Leaving me here with a bastard child, sired by a French invader nobody wanted here.” Clearly, Maeve had abandoned all diplomatic sensitivities. She considered her life forfeit, just because she was carrying his child; there was nothing worse he could do to her than that. “Just let me end it.”

“Not,” he growled, “at the risk of your own life.”

Maeve shook her head. How hopeless she looked, for just this moment, he thought. “My life was forfeit the night you sired this… the night you got me with child.” Thing, she had meant to say. With Maeve, it clearly wasn’t about faith. She didn’t reject the baby because of its father being a Christian, but for its father being Raymond.

Raymond hated and loved and desired this cruelly pragmatic woman.

Maeve took a step back and sat down on her bed. There was defeat in her motions. “Just… leave me. Please.”

He did, but only because he knew she would not harm herself in her sister’s home. There were little enough securities in Maeve’s life, but her devotion to her sister could not be disputed. It was what had gotten her into his bed in the first place. Raymond gave one sharp nod, and left Maeve in her small chamber, bar all comforts. The palaces he could build her…

Raymond left her room, but not the house. He found Thomas in his study, sipping cheap, watery ale as he perused some documents. “Sir Raymond,” he exclaimed in surprise and made to stand up. Watching his pathetic performance, Raymond wondered where Maeve got her pride, her self-assurance from. Clearly not from her father’s side, if the uncle was any indication. “What may I do for you?”

“As undoubtedly even you realised, Maeve is pregnant,” Raymond announced without ceremony. “The child is mine.” That surely could not be a surprise. Thomas was, after all, the man who had brokered the deal, though Maeve had sealed it.

“She tried to get rid of it,” Raymond said coolly. Had tried more than once. “Unsuccessfully.”

Thomas fidgeted with his tankard of ale. This was far beyond his comfort level, on so many accounts.  The harsh, violent man before him had impregnated his unmarried niece. The proud, strong daughter of his brother whom he had promised to protect; and failed. “Maeve is not married,” he said, for lack of a better reply.

“I am aware.”    

Thomas sighed. Maeve… it was the moment he deemed her a lost cause. Raymond felt murderous at the obvious helplessness and indifference of her uncle, who should have cared and displayed outrage on her behalf. “Persuade her to marry me,” he snapped. “She would not agree when I asked her. Get Maeve to see sense.”

Thomas straightened his shoulders. He was surprised that Raymond de Merville had offered to do the honourable thing; though he wasn’t surprised Maeve had refused. It was her pagan blood, half-born from the wildness. She would rather die on her own terms than get caught in a man’s cage. “Persuade her yourself, Sir Raymond. My niece has her own mind. There is nothing you or I can do to change her mind if she has made her choice.”

Raymond did not look pleased at his reply. “Be it on your head then. For where your town, your faith, is concerned, your niece is carrying a bastard child. I do not want that. Whatever happens now is on your head…and hers.”

Thomas nodded. “Yes. Maeve will have her reasons.” It was one of the few moments where he became aware of his eldest niece’s advantages: whatever she did was her own business. She asked for nothing from him, and he had to take no responsibility for her. “Sir Raymond,” Thomas called out quietly when the Frenchman had just turned furiously to leave this bloody heathen family to their own devices. “Maeve is young, but she is proud and mature beyond her years. She knows what she wants. If that does not include you, my advice is to let her go, and let her deal with…. With the child in the way she deems best.”

“No,” Raymond growled. “That child is mine.”

“And it wouldn’t have come to be if Maeve’s wishes had played any role,” Thomas said drily. He felt bold tonight – there was little Raymond de Merville could do to him now that would humiliate his family further. “Not to mention that it will be Maeve who will have to bear it, birth it. Who will have to live with the shame of a bastard child.” The last months had made Blackwater an even bleaker, harsher place to call home. Thomas was no longer sure that Maeve would be safe from her actions’ consequences. The people had turned their backs on her, and did not seem inclined to change their minds.

“She wouldn’t have to!” Raymond exclaimed. “I will marry her, Blackhawk. If you can get her to see reason.” 

Thomas gave a curt nod. Yes, he would mention it to Maeve. No, he did not think she would ever agree. She reminded him of his older brother, and she made him proud to be a Blackhawk.

“You know,” Maeve greeted Thomas when he came to see her that night.

Thomas nodded. “Sir Raymond left little doubt to it. He said that the child is his. He also said he would marry you-“

Maeve chuckled mirthlessly. “How honourable of him. After months of violating me, disgracing me, he stoops to marry me now that an heir is on the horizon.”

Thomas wrung his hands uncomfortably. “Would it be the worst to happen to you?”

Maeve sat up and looked at him with her clear green eyes. Heathen, pagan, wild. Thomas had never understood what had tempted his older brother to love the tribal woman who had borne him Maeve. His own niece, as much as he loved her, unsettled him. “I would rather bear a bastard and face the shame that accompanies it than shackle myself to Raymond de Merville. The shame will fade. Marriage will not.” The power she would hand to him. Power over her body, her life, the child. No.

Her uncle shook his head. “If you are certain.”

Maeve smiled, suddenly softening towards her uncle. For all his faults, he had taken care of her and Ella. Never had he let her feel the discomfort she knew he felt towards her. Thomas had let her roam freely, had never subjected her to imagined rules and restrictions. Had let her wander the woods. Maeve stood up and embraced him. “It is the only way, uncle. I love you, and I love Ella. But I do not nor will I ever love Raymond de Merville. I would rather be shamed and disgraced, knowing I am safe with you, than be caged in by him.”

Thomas patted her head awkwardly. “Maeve, dear…. I wish I could guarantee you that. But… Even if I can, de Merville can offer you more. Comfort, riches. A name for your child.”

Maeve stood back. “I want none of that. I just want my life to go back to what it was.”

“It never will, Maeve.” It turned out that for once, Thomas was right.


End file.
